


Bullet

by emmaliza



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Character Death, Class Issues, Drama, Homophobia, Multi, Post-Episode: s04e09 Sand
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:46:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 28,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23751793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmaliza/pseuds/emmaliza
Summary: Following the events of "Sand", Tarrant is not in the good books with his crewmates. Things get worse for him when they run into an old friend of his, and with him, a whole lot of politics.
Relationships: Dayna Mellanby/Del Tarrant, Del Tarrant/Original Male Character, Del Tarrant/Servalan, Kerr Avon/Del Tarrant, implied Avon/Blake, past Avon/Tynus
Comments: 41
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

“I can't believe you.”

Tarrant sighed. He'd thought, once the others had duly expressed their disgust with him and Avon had rubbed in his face how unlikely his forbidden lover was to leave the site of their rendezvous alive, he'd be allowed to slink off to his quarters with his tail between his legs, to wrestle with his guilt and confusion in private. He should have realised that was too much to hope for.

“Well I've never considered myself that extraordinary, so that suggests a failure in imagination.”

Dayna rounded on him with a look he had only ever seen in her eyes before she took fire. Tarrant had always thought he and Dayna got on rather well, better than he did with anyone else on this ship – but that didn't help matters, that just gave her more reason to feel betrayed.

“You did, didn't you? With _her_?”

“Yes, Dayna, I did.” He wondered if he should claim it wasn't his fault, that the sand must have affected him psychologically somehow, like it did the computers. But no, Dayna would never believe that. And even if she would, she deserved better. “And you fell in love with a mad scientist old enough to be your father. Isolation does strange things to people.”

“You were there for a _day_!” Tarrant sighed. Yes, he thought that was a weak excuse. “And it was her. Servalan. Did you forget what she did to my father? Or your brother? What about Cally?”

“No I didn't forget!” he snapped in frustration. But it wasn't Dayna he was frustrated with, really. “But it wasn't...” he hesitated, struggling to put words to what it _was_. He couldn't. He couldn't explain it to himself, let alone her.

His eyes drifted to Dayna's arm, where the bullet had hit her. The skin had been healed, but not the fabric. Still, they were lucky that happened. Otherwise Dayna would have been down there, with him and Servalan, on Virn, and then... well, he didn't want to think about it.

Tarrant sighed. “You wouldn't understand.”

“No, I wouldn't. I don't.” Dayna stormed off to her own quarters, then hesitated outside the door. “Don't expect me to spare her though, just because you think you've discovered her sensitive side. I still want her dead as much as ever. And if you get in my way, I'll kill you too.”

Tarrant gave her a humourless grin. “What, don't you trust me?”

Dayna scowled at him, entering her room without an answer.

* * *

“This is Commissioner Sleer, currently leaving orbit around the planet Virn, are you receiving me, base? Base? Answer!”

Alix jumped from her seat where she had started to nod off. “This is Commander Ryddin, receiving you, commissioner.” She tried to keep the tiredness from her voice. Oh, to think she had been excited when she'd been told they were receiving a visit from Federation top brass – this dinky little station was so in the middle of nowhere, and so underpopulated, it was exciting when anyone other than the six of them showed up at all. Except Commissioner Sleer had been there a matter of hours, delivered orders as if a respected commander was just a servant girl, and then left them working twelve hour shifts just so they would know when she was coming back, without a clue when the call might come. And the man she brought with her was worse. Alix wasn't looking forward to their return at all.

“Ah, Alix. Good.” She gritted her teeth against Sleer's casual appropriation of her given name – she'd been warned, quite strenuously, that Sleer wasn't a woman whose bad side you wanted to get on, and it wasn't worth doing so over something as petty as Sleer's refusal to use her proper title, infuriating as it was. “I'm afraid the mission to Virn did not go as we had hoped. We found what happened to Don Keller, but we could not extract the valuable substance he found, and two of my crew were lost. I'll be returning in two hours. Make sure proper arrangements are made to make my stay comfortable before I can return to Earth.”

“Yes, Commissioner,” said Alix, just about keeping herself from calling the woman a sardonic _your majesty_ instead.

“Oh, and Alix, there's something you might do for me.” Alix stomach dropped. _Was there_? She'd heard doing favours for Sleer wasn't something you ever wanted to be faced with – it had a tendency to get you killed, one way or another. “A piece of information I picked up on Virn, and I'd like you to look into. Look up the personal files of a man called Videl Oron. He should be in the databanks.”

Alix blinked. Alright. That was a strange request, but she didn't feel particularly eager to pry. Surely Sleer knew what she was doing, and even if she didn't, how much trouble could looking up a man's file possibly cause?

* * *

On the flight deck, Avon sat alone, watching the small dot leaving the surface of Virn from miles away. He smiled to himself. _So she made it out after all._ He always knew she would, of course. He had known Servalan a long time, longer than Tarrant, and gathered she was nigh-unkillable – if the destruction of the Liberator couldn't do it, he doubted some sand would. Perhaps it was petty of him then, to rub the possibility of her demise in Tarrant's face, but he didn't find himself wracked with remorse – he and Tarrant had been cruel and petty to each other a thousand times since they first met, what was one more instance?

Besides, he ought to have made a point of reminding Tarrant how little reason he had to grieve such a woman. How little reason anyone had.

“Slave, head back to Xenon base.” It would not do to be still skulking about when Servalan broke free enough to check her scanners. She would be up to her usual tricks before long – no doubt she would find them again sooner or later, but Avon would rather it were later.

“At once, Master.”

Really, the mystery was why she had let Tarrant go at all. If her pilot really was alive, as the ship departing Virn's surface seemed to indicate, then she had no need of him, and could easily have eliminated one enemy while he had his guard down. Avon had never known her to pass up an opportunity.

He did not for a second entertain Tarrant's romantic delusions, the ones he wouldn't speak aloud, that he had truly touched her heart when he had touched her body, found the woman beneath the tyrant. After all, Avon had touched her too, if not so thoroughly, and found there was nothing to find. Just a dark, empty void, that threatened to tear you up and eat you alive if you got too close. A black hole given human form. If he hadn't learned that earlier, he had learned it on Terminal.

 _No,_ Avon mused as he looked over his shoulder, toward the door where Tarrant had left, bravely exposing himself to Dayna's line of fire. If Servalan let him go, surely she had a reason for it. No doubt, she was setting a trap for him, and hence the rest of them, this very moment.

He was rather curious to see what she would do.

* * *

“Are you sure that's the man you were looking for?”

Alix felt rather uneasy as Commissioner Sleer smiled, examining the file she had bothered to print out and put in a folder (she could go above and beyond the call of duty when circumstances required it – namely, when dealing with someone she had no doubt would not hesitate to kill her if she didn't). “Oh, yes,” she said, sounding very pleased indeed. “This is him. Videl Oron, born to Delta-grade parents back on Earth. Reassigned after his exceptional test results, and attended the Federation Space Academy for a number of years. Then expelled for – well, it doesn't bear talking about, does it?”

Yes, Alix had read the file, she knew the details. And yet. “But he's just a Delta ship mechanic, isn't he?” she asked, unable to shake the feeling she was in over her head. “What do you want with him?”

“Oh, it's not what I want.” Sleer grinned at her, panther-like. “But what someone else might.”


	2. Chapter 2

The console beeped at them insistently.

“What do you think it is?” asked Dayna.

“Distress signal, most likely,” said Tarrant. “Rudimentary, but effective. We should follow it.”

“Why?” Avon queried, never one to let someone else say what should be done without question.

“There could be people in trouble!”

“Or people long dead, on whom your dashing heroics would be sorely wasted.” Avon grinned at him slightly.

“Or it could be a trap,” said Soolin. “What's the matter, Tarrant? Planning a romantic rendezvous with your new girlfriend?”

Tarrant gritted his teeth. “Very funny. Tell me, how long am I going to be the butt of every joke?”

“Welcome to my world,” Vila mused from his seat, drink in hand.

“All of those are distinct possibilities,” said Avon, neatly drawing a line under the conversation. “Without further investigation, there is no way of knowing which of the three is most likely. If it is, as it seems on the surface, an innocent vessel in trouble, there's no particular reason we shouldn't indulge Tarrant's impulse to go rescue it, so long as it seems reasonably safe. If the crew are already dead, then well – it's likely a valuable collection of resources, which we can swipe without their legal owners being likely to give us much trouble.”

Tarrant frowned as Avon elaborated their options. He seemed to be giving Tarrant's idea, making it seem more reasonable than it really was. That wasn't like him. Usually he took any chance to put Tarrant in his place.

He wasn't the only one unsettled by this. “And if it's a trap?” Dayna asked, prowling toward Avon's shoulder.

Avon raised an eyebrow. “If it is a trap, then no doubt it's Servalan's. If so, I don't think avoiding it will do us much good in the long run – she usually has another prepared.” He grinned again. “Think of it this way, Dayna – if we walk straight towards her, we might just shoot her between the eyes.”

That wasn't really a good enough reason to take the risk, but they all knew there was little point arguing with Avon when he had his mind set on something – at least these days. Tarrant struggled to repress a flinch at the thought they really might kill Servalan. His crewmates already had enough doubts about his loyalty, it wouldn't do to show any hesitation over murdering their archnemesis. After all, it wasn't like he thought his reticence would be at all shared – their truce on Virn had been the result of extraordinary circumstances, and Tarrant would be a fool to think Servalan would feel any inclination to pity him now they had left. Despite what Avon always said, Tarrant wasn't a fool.

“Right,” Soolin sounded less than convinced also, but she wasn't going to refuse. “Slave. Home in on that signal, and plot a course toward it. Get as close as you can without getting in range of any weapons systems.” She fixed Avon with a typically cold look. “I hope you know what you're doing.”

* * *

“What is it?”

“It looks like a civillian cruiser,” Avon said, examining the ship they'd encountered on the scanner – although it was close enough Dayna suspected you could see it with the naked eye, if you'd had anything to look from. That took them by surprise, and they were sure Slave must have disobeyed their instructions to keep out of range of any weapons, before the computer explained with characteristic sorriness that the ship had no weapons.

Dayna's experience with ships, particularly ships that weren't intent on killing her, was necessarily limited, so she took his word for it. “It doesn't look like it's going anywhere soon,” she said, as the long grey block drifted in space.

“No.” Avon stood up. “I think you were right, Tarrant. It seems as if they've run into some sort of trouble, and are now stranded. Without help, they'll never return to civilisation.”

Dayna gritted her teeth. She knew she was being petty, but she couldn't help but feel rather annoyed with Tarrant getting credit for being right, after he displayed such a spectacular lack of judgement on Virn. It didn't take that much skill to determine a ship that claimed to be in trouble really was in trouble, after all. There was a one in three chance.

“So what do we do?” asked Tarrant, sounding just as self-assured as ever.

“First of all, we might send a message.” Avon sat at the console and pressed the button to open comms. “Attention. This is freight carrier Scorpio. We have received your distress call, and await information on what has affected you and what aid you require. Over.”

Silence. After waiting a moment, Soolin sighed. “Well now what?”

“We send over a boarding party,” said Tarrant. “I'll go. God knows I could use getting off this ship–”

“No,” declared Avon, taking everyone by surprise. Tarrant glared at him, as if to ask _why?_ , and Avon continued. “Vila will.”

Vila sat up in alarm. “What? Why me?” he cried, wine splashing onto his hand in the excitement. Under other circumstances, Dayna would find his fear amusing.

“If, as I suspect, the crew are not answering us because they are not there to answer, then we will need someone to get into their vital areas to ascertain what happened,” Avon said. “That means you, Vila.”

“Does it? Really? Oh no,” he moaned miserably. “I bet whatever took them out is right over there waiting for me as well. Absolutely typical.”

“I'll go with him, then,” Tarrant said firmly. “He'll need backup.”

“Oh no you don't.” Dayna stood in his way as he strode over to the teleport. Soolin's comment from earlier rang in her ears: _planning a romantic rendezvous with your new girlfriend?_ She didn't think Tarrant was trying to lure them into a trap on purpose, not really, but Servalan could well be waiting for them on that ship, and who knew what he would do if she was? She couldn't rely on him. “I'll go.”

Tarrant gave her a look. “You really don't trust me anymore, do you?” He seemed hurt. _He_ was hurt, when he was the one who–

“Should I?”

That didn't help, but she told herself it didn't matter. She strode over to the teleport herself, winding the bracelet around her wrist and leaving no time for anyone to argue. “Come on, Vila.”

Vila got to his feet very reluctantly. “Must I?” he asked as he staggered over. “You know what, maybe you two should beam down. I mean, you've clearly got some things you need to sort out–”

Dayna slapped the bracelet on him herself. “Come _on_.” And he was still protesting as Soolin beamed them down.

* * *

They reappeared in a dark, dull grey corridor. A service duct, probably. “Typical,” Vila muttered, “couldn't have put us down in the bar, could they? Let us have a nice time before we get killed?”

He braced himself for the _shut up, Vila_ he knew was coming, and yet it didn't. Strange. It was also strange when he took a sniff of the air – for a second he thought he smelled something, but no, that wasn't it. The air smelled the same as normal, it just felt like there wasn't quite enough of it.

Vila really started to worry then. “Dayna? What do you think is happening here?” Was it just him, or was this place bizarrely quiet? You could usually hear everything on a ship in a service duct; it made them very good places to steal from.

She still didn't answer him, instead slinking along the corridor with her gun in hand. Vila got annoyed with this. “Oi! What's the matter with you then?”

Dayna stopped. Awkwardly, she re-holstered her gun. “I'm not really _that_ repulsive, am I?”

To his credit, Vila was only thrown a second. “Oh, you know I don't think so.” When Dayna failed to respond to that with her usual effortless dismissal, he frowned. “Why do you ask?”

She hesitated. “It's just... with Tarrant...” _Oh._ He should have realised. “I don't know. But it always seemed like, well, he might – until it didn't. Until it seemed like he'd rather sleep with anyone but me. Even _her_.”

“Right.” Vila gritted his teeth nervously. He wasn't sure he wanted to be drawn into the drama surrounding Tarrant's love life – he was usually reluctant to get drawn into Tarrant's anything. Still, at least it would take his mind off the various ways they could die here. Although he wasn't sure which of imagining death or imagining Tarrant having sex was worse. “Well, you know Tarrant. He probably doesn't want to take advantage of you.”

Dayna was nonplussed. “Take advantage of me?!”

Vila's stomach sunk further. He really shouldn't have said that. “It's just, well,” he rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, “growing up on Sarran, not a lot of fellas about, you probably – well I always assumed you were–”

“What, a virgin?” Vila nodded, and Dayna shrugged uncomfortably. “Well, yes, but it's not like I'm saving myself or anything. Like you said, I didn't have a lot of options.”

“Sure, but Tarrant might not see it that way,” he said. “He has a chivalrous streak.”

“Maybe.” Dayna sighed heavily. “Honestly, I don't even know if I want Tarrant, or if he's just the first man anywhere near my age I've known for more than two weeks. My taste can be – questionable.” She paused, then chuckled. “I kissed Avon the first time I ever saw him.”

Vila blinked in surprise. “Surprised you came out with your lips in tact.” The he paused. “Hang on, why hasn't any of this rampant sexual frustration been directed my way, then?”

Dayna laughed. “I have some standards, Vila.”

“Oi!” But he was glad to have cheered her up, at least.

“Anyway,” Dayna stopped as they came to a metal door. “Should we have a look what's actually happened on this ship?”

Vila really didn't want to, but he didn't see he had much of a choice. He lowered his fingers to the opening mechanism, preparing to work his magic, then stopped. “It's not locked.”

“What?”

He pushed it open with an anticlimactic _oof_. “See?” _Brilliant, if I do get killed here it will be completely pointless. Thanks a bunch, Avon._

Dayna seemed as confused by this as he was. “Huh,” she said, then shrugged again. “Well, shall we?”

They emerged into what seemed like an indoor pool, a giant vizscreen up above displaying pictures of tropical wildlife and sunsets. _Now that's more like it,_ thought Vila, and wondered if he could get a cocktail around here.

That is, until he saw the bodies.

The first ones were just laying on the deck chairs, so you could mistake them for just napping, but not the ones in the water. They were bobbing along in the water like apples, and Vila felt terror sink into his bones.

“They're all dead!” Dayna gasped, horrified. “What happened?”

“Don't know.” Vila eyed one of the corpses, a middle-aged woman in a white bikini looking peacefully asleep on a chair. Her body hadn't rotted at all, so presumably this had happened recently, hours ago. _Meaning whatever killed them is probably still here._ “But let's figure it out from back on Scorpio, yeah?”

Dayna opened her mouth, either to argue or to agree, but before she could they heard footsteps. Eyes wide, Dayna hurried him to hide behind a fern, and Vila did so readily.

Between the leaves he and Dayna huddled together and peaked through to see who was coming. A figure entered from the same doorway they did, then stopped. Vila couldn't get a very good look. He thought it was a man, but that was about all.

Suddenly, Dayna jumped out from behind. “Don't move!” she said, gun pointed at the man. “Who are you?”

 _Dayna, what are you doing?_ thought Vila, but when she wasn't immediately killed in a hail of laserfire, he nervously poked his head around the fern as well.

The man standing in the doorway was short and dark, clad in the shapeless grey jumpsuit of a service worker. He had only a spanner in hand to defend himself with, but he did not show any fear in the face of Dayna's gun.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he said. “As well as: what are you doing on my ship?”


	3. Chapter 3

Vila and Dayna shared a look. “Your ship?” Vila couldn't help but ask. He didn't want to be rude, but the man didn't exactly look like Space Captain material, no more than Vila himself did.

The man sighed. “Well, not exactly,” he said. “But with everyone else on board dead, I suppose that makes me captain by default. More than you are, anyway. So I repeat the first question: who are you?”

After a few moments awkward staring, Dayna reluctantly holstered her gun. This man didn't seem likely to attack with just his handy spanner, and it wasn't like her to shoot someone who couldn't fight back. “My name is Dayna, and this is Vila,” she introduced them. “We picked up a distress signal.”

“I sent that signal,” said the man. “Though your approach to rescue is a bit more aggressive than I was expecting.”

Vila was starting to feel sheepish, but Dayna showed no such shame. “We thought it might be a trap.”

The man's eyebrows raised. “You special enough to be lured into traps, are you?”

_Er, about that._ Vila wasn't sure he trusted this man enough yet to go letting on who they were and what they were afraid of, so it seemed they needed a distraction. “Er, don't worry about her,” he said, taking a step closing to the man's side. “She can be a bit shoot-first, questions-later. We really don't mean you any harm. You have a name?”

He looked wary – understandably – but his grip on the spanner loosened. “Oron. Videl Oron.”

Vila shook his hand, for a second forgetting the dead bodies they were surrounded by. Until he remembered, and that made it even more unsettling than it was the first time. He didn't like the thought he was getting numb to this sort of thing. “So what _happened_ here?

The man – Videl – sighed. “Carbon monoxide poisoning, I think. Must have picked up a bunch of bad air last time we refueled. I told the captain we should wait until we made sector 6, that 7 is full of frauds and cheats, but god knows he didn't listen.”

Vila nodded along sympathetically, with a queasy lurch of gratitude for Scorpio's air recycling system. The way it worked on these old passenger ships, where you were relying on picking up oxygen in big boxes along the way, from shady merchants on backwater planets, and if you at all went off course then chances were you'd all choke before you got back – it seemed unfathomably dangerous, and Vila couldn't see why anyone took the risk.

Meanwhile Dayna queried: “How come you survived?”

“I was in the hold when I noticed the air getting thinner,” Videl said. “Sealed myself in and waited twelve hours to pass, so we'd be on to the next batch. When I came out again, the air was fine, but everyone was dead.”

Dayna tilted her head. “Doesn't sound like you tried very hard to save them.”

“What was _I_ meant to do?!” Videl scowled. “I couldn't have gotten the bad air out – those boxes weigh a tonne, you need five men and heavy machinery to move them, you can't do it while dying of asphyxiation. And I thought there must be some sort of safety procedure. I thought worst come to worst, they'd make a break for it on the life capsules. I didn't think I'd walk out and see the bodies!”

“Hey, hey, it's alright.” Unthinkingly, Vila grabbed his arm as a note of hysteria crept into his voice. Vaguely, he realised Videl looked younger up-close than he did from afar – not that Vila had thought he was particularly old, but he couldn't have been more than twenty-five.

Then Dayna looked a little shamefaced. “Sorry. I didn't mean to – accuse you of anything.”

Videl shook his head, and with it, any hint of emotion off. “It doesn't matter. I wasn't particularly close to anyone, anyway.” It wasn't very convincing, but Vila decided he was better off not prying.

Again trying to distract everyone he joked: “Listen, maybe you could try harder to win her over,” he said. “Try paying her some compliments. She's feeling a bit undesirable at the moment.”

“ _Vila._ ” Dayna glared at him, but Videl just laughed.

“Oh, you're very beautiful, but not quite my type, I'm afraid.” Dayna looked a bit nonplussed, and he elaborated: “I never found myself able to care for the fairer sex on anything but a strictly platonic level.”

“Oh,” Vila said, then blinked. “Wait, does that mean you're – I mean, no offence intended, I want to be friendly, but that's all.”

Videl rolled his eyes. “Relax, you're not my type either.”

“...Now I'm confused,” said Vila. “What is your type?”

That got him a smirk. “Young, brave, handsome.”

“Oh.” Vila couldn't help but pout. “Guess I'm really not your type.”

* * *

“They've been gone too long.”

Someone had to say it, and Soolin apparently had selflessly volunteered herself for that duty. “Perhaps something's distracted them,” Avon murmured, face giving nothing away, as ever.

“Yes, like a life-or-death struggle,” Tarrant pointed out, body thrumming with tension. They had tried to make contact, but gotten no response. “I say we teleport over and rescue them.”

Avon raised an eyebrow. “You are eager to see what's on board, aren't you?”

Tarrant gritted his teeth. Yes, he understood why, but his crewmates' casual distrust was really starting to wear on his nerves. “I'm _eager_ to see Vila and Dayna back aboard safely.” Even if Dayna was angry at him, and Vila had never liked him at the best of times, that was no reason to abandon them to what may come; Tarrant didn't make a habit of disloyalty, defection from the organisation he'd spent his entire adolescence training to be a part of notwithstanding. “We can't all trade people away like pawns in a chess match. If they're in trouble–”

“If they are in trouble, it follows that whatever has them in that trouble acted quickly, if they didn't get the chance to message us first. Therefore, it follows that if we beamed across, we would likely be captured just as quickly, and hence no use to them whatsoever. It would be more helpful if we tried to ascertain something about the situation we're walking into if we are to have any chance of rescuing them, if indeed they need rescue.” Tarrant swallowed his anger, unable to argue with Avon's icy logic, while he turned to Soolin. “Are the scans showing anything?”

She sighed. “Not much. Seems like a perfectly normal civillian cruiser, marooned and drifting. There are life signs aboard, but not many – no more than five. Dayna, Vila, and whoever else is on board.” She paused. “I wonder what happened.”

Avon said nothing, inscrutable as ever, and Tarrant leapt to his feet. “Well I'm not going to sit here waiting,” he declared. “If you're not willing to risk yourself to find them, _I_ am–”

“Yes, your recklessness has been noted.”

“Is this a joke to y–?”

Tarrant's rebuke got cut short. Suddenly something blasted them, leaving Scorpio careening wildly and Tarrant clutching his console to stay upright. “What was that?”

“Laser fire,” Soolin said, punching up the auxillary scanners to see where it was coming from. “Federation pursuit ships. They're after us.”

Tarrant couldn't help but gawp as three of the sleek, black, familiar ships came into view. “They must have followed us from Virn,” he whispered.

Soolin gave him a cold hard look. “Or they've been here the whole time.”

That left him recoiling. _I didn't know,_ he wanted to say, but he didn't want to dignify her suspicions with a denial – indeed he thought that would only make her more suspicious. So he ignored it. “We have to get them out now,” he hissed.

“We can't!”Avon shouted, just as an another wave of blaster fire shook them just to emphasise his point. “Not while we're being rocked about like this. If we try transporting them to a moving point, _we're_ as likely to kill them as the Federation.”

Tarrant's stomach lurched, both from the shaking of the ship and the queasy realisation that Avon was right. _There must be something we can do –_ after all, hadn't everyone come all this way because of him?

All of a sudden the shaking stopped. That should have been a relief, but Tarrant didn't find it so, not as the Federation ships slid right over them and headed toward their true target.

“They're not after us,” he realised as a beam of green light formed from the stern of the pursuit vessel, aimed toward the ship where Dayna, Vila, and god knew who else were were waiting. “They're after them.”


	4. Chapter 4

“What was that?”

A blast of something sent the ship rocking and all of them falling onto the floor, Vila narrowly avoiding rolling into the pool with all the dead bodies. Dayna clung to a chair while Oron braced himself against a plastic palm tree. “No idea,” he said. “Friends of yours?”

Another wave hit them, and Dayna scrambled to avoid going flying. “Hardly,” she said. Federation, most likely. Had this really been a trap? It felt wrong somehow. Maybe someone just followed them here – Servalan, most likely.

She jumped when something grabbed her ankle – just Vila. He was staying low to the ground, which didn't seem a bad idea when another attack came and Dayna thought her leg might break. “Dayna, lets get out of here,” he said.

“We can't,” said Dayna. If they were under attack no doubt the others were two, and how many times had Avon told them you can't teleport between two fast-moving points, you'll just end up a smear in space. “Not until we get out of this.” She turned to Oron. “Does this ship have any weapons? Can we fight back?”

He shook his head. “This is a cruise ship, it doesn't carry weapons.” Dayna sighed in frustration. Why would anyone design a ship without weapons? “We can run though, come on.”

It wasn't easy to move under the bombardment, but they managed, Dayna pulling Vila to his feet as Oron led them back into the steel corridor, clanging their way through several flights of stairs as they tried not to trip and die, until they reached another cold door. “Locked,” Oron hissed.

“Allow me,” Vila pushed him aside readily, the simple mechanism sliding apart easily. Oron blinked, impressed.

They entered onto what was clearly the flight deck, two men's bodies slumped over the controls. The pilots, presumably. Unceremoniously Oron grabbed one of them under the arms and dumped him on the floor, wincing at the sound his body made. “Sorry,” he muttered.

Dayna looked up to a vent on the back wall. You'd think the pilots would have their own supply of oxygen, in case of emergency, but then again this ship didn't seem to have put safety first and foremost in its design. Her father would have been appalled, and he made weapons.

“Er,” Vila said, awkwardly, as Oron slid into the pilot's chair. “Do you know how to fly this thing, then?”

She flinched. Of course, neither she nor Vila was a pilot – and they had no reason to believe their new friend was either. _If only Tarrant was here,_ she thought, remembering that if she hadn't been so angry, jealous and paranoid, he would have been.

“Should do,” said Oron, cutting off her reverie. “Let's see how much I remember.”

* * *

“Avon, we have to fire back!”

“There's no point,” Avon grimly watched the blaster fire unleashed on the other ship. “We're not on Liberator anymore. Scorpio doesn't have the capacity to take on a Federation fleet. If we tried, we'd be blasted out of the sky.”

Tarrant gritted his teeth. _And who lost us Liberator, then?_ he wanted to retort, but he knew it wouldn't help.

“So what do we do?” Soolin asked.

Avon said nothing. He didn't have an answer either; he was as helpless as the rest of them. Helpless. There was nothing Tarrant hated quite like feeling helpless. Servalan – it must have been her, yes. She was about to send Dayna and Vila to their deaths and there was nothing they could do about it. _Servalan..._

“Soolin, open comm units.”

She seemed surprised. “Why?”

Tarrant hesitated. He knew it would sound stupid when he said it aloud – it sounded quite stupid in his own head – but he didn't have a choice. “I think I might be able to talk to her.”

Avon and Soolin seemed exactly as unimpressed by that as he expected. “Really,” said Soolin, withering, while Avon simply turned around and stared at him blankly.

He sighed. He knew what they must think – that he was being naïve, foolish and romantic, assuming that his physical connection with the woman who'd never shown any hesitation to destroy anyone who got in her way meant he could reason with her, talk her into sparing his friends' lives. He returned his gaze to the laser fire on the scanner. “She's holding back,” he realised. “She could have blasted us both into oblivion and been on her merry way, but she hasn't. She's not come all this way just for us. She must want _something_.” He grinned. “And that gives us leverage.”

Avon still seemed unconvinced. “And you really think she'll listen to you?”

“She _might_ ,” Tarrant was starting to lose his patience. “Look, we don't have many other options! If we don't want to just sit here and watch Dayna and Vila die, we have to do something!”

After a moments pause, Avon turned to Soolin and nodded. She sighed, and pressed the button to start broadcasting.

Tarrant froze. He hadn't expected them to be convinced so easily; he'd been expecting a little more time to figure out what he should actually say. While he wracked his brains, Servalan's cool, smooth, confident voice filled the air, cutting him short: “Ah, Tarrant,” she said. “I was hoping you might call.”

* * *

The ship guided smoothly under Oron's hands – or as smoothly as you can while under attack from a Federation battle fleet. Dayna was mildly surprised by this, but Vila appeared a lot more so, for some reason. Still, they both new better than to distract the man by asking questions.

He was good at dodging the attacks as they came in, but unfortunately there were three of them, and they couldn't outrun them entirely – so he had to dodge in one direction, only to get fired at from another.

“I can't do this forever,” he warned, teeth gritted together. Dayna realised that. The ship had already withstood more fire than you'd expect from a civillian cruiser with no weapons and, presumably, no real defenses.

_What do we do?_ She raised her bracelet to her mouth, called “Avon?” but it was no use. The laser beams must have been scrambling the signals.

“Hang on, I've got an idea,” said Oron, which came as a relief. “You might have to trust me for a bit, though.” Which did not. “Hold tight.”

* * *

On the other end of the line, Tarrant did his best not to smile. “Well, I didn't want to appear too needy,” he said, like they had all the time in the world, and he wasn't desperately trying not to panic – and wondering if this hail mary was in fact him doing just that.

Servalan chuckled. “It's not a good idea to make a girl wait too long though. Otherwise you might find her doing something rather extreme to get your attention.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Is that what you're doing, trying to get my attention?” he asked, not believing it for a second.

All the while he could feel Avon's eyes on him, examining him – how easily he spoke to her, how they defaulted to flirting, how even with his friends' lives on the line, it wasn't entirely unlike how it was on Virn. He felt rather exposed by Avon's scrutinising gaze, but did his best to ignore it. He was at least trying to save them after all.

“You would like that, wouldn't you?” Tarrant swore he could hear that savage grin of hers, the jaguar bearing her teeth before swallowing him whole. “I'm afraid I feel little reason to divulge my motives at this point.”

Damn. He'd hoped he could get the better of her tendency to gloat. “Of course.” While he tried to figure what to say next, he got distracted by the screen in front – the other ship, which had been valiantly dodging the blows of the Federation vessels (Tarrant had no idea who was piloting it; he didn't think Vila or Dayna would be capable of that, so presumably they must have found someone there), had stopped. It was now holding position directly in front of the enemy, laser canons pointing at it from either side.

_Hang on, I know that trick..._

“Tarrant?” Servalan didn't sound happy to be forgotten about. Tarrant blinked back to reality.

“Call off the attack, Servalan,” he said, to her dismissive laughter. “If you wanted them dead, they'd be gone already. So that's not what you want. Whatever it is, you'd do better with living hostages to negotiate with.”

* * *

“What are we doing?” Vila eyed the ships in front of them nervously. When Videl said he had a plan, he'd hoped it might be something other than 'walk right up to their guns and sit there to be shot at'.

“Waiting,” said Videl, which wasn't reassuring really.

At least the shooting had stopped – the Federation ships seemed puzzled by their behaviour, perhaps thinking it was a trap. Vila hoped it was.

He gave Dayna a look, but she just shrugged at him, as puzzled as he was. All of a sudden the screen flashed green.

“Now!” Oron yelled, and everything plunged south.


	5. Chapter 5

Tarrant was waiting on bated breath for Servalan's response when he saw the green light and the ship delving down to get out of the way. The laser fire, of course, kept going in the same way – onto the ship aiming from the other direction, the two of them hitting each other while Dayna and Vila ran for it. He couldn't help but smile. _I thought that was it._

There was a silence, and then Servalan, calm and collected as ever, said: “Alright.” Most likely she was reluctant to incur damage to her ships unnecessarily, rather than he had displayed any particularly impressive negotiating tactics, but he would take it. “On one condition.”

Ah. He should have known there would be a catch. “And what's that, then?”

“That you teleport over to my ship.” Tarrant blinked in surprise, while Soolin and Avon turned to give him a look. “You're a clever boy, I'm sure you can deduce the co-ordinates. Well? Wouldn't you say we had unfinished business together?”

Tarrant hesitated. Well, this wouldn't assuage his crewmates' suspicions that his loyalty was in question. But he told himself it didn't matter. Dayna and Vila's lives were at stake, he could cope with a little doubt. “Maybe so,” he sighed. “Alright. I'll see you soon.”

Soolin switched off the comm unit for him, before raising her eyebrows. “Well that's convenient.”

Yes, he thought she might say that. “I don't have a choice, Soolin. I'm not going because I want to,” he said, already getting up and strapping a bracelet to his wrist.

“You don't seem particularly reluctant, though.”

Tarrant opted to ignore that. Maybe it seemed too true. “Avon, have you calculated the co-ordinates?”

Avon scoffed. “She's metres away, it's not exactly advanced calculation.” He punched them in efficiently, and Tarrant decided to presume he wasn't about to thrown into deep space just to be on the safe side. Avon still needed a pilot, after all. “You do realise you're likely walking into a trap, right?”

“Oh, undoubtedly,” he grinned. “But hopefully I can survive in it long enough for you to get Vila and Dayna back, and then start worrying about me.” _I'm sure Servalan would like to see me in ropes,_ he considered adding, but thought better of it.

“I see,” Avon didn't sound convinced. “And if it seems we don't have to worry about you so much after all?”

Tarrant grimaced. “Then blast us both out of the sky,” he said, and Avon beamed him across before he could change his mind.

* * *

After her teeth stopped chattering, Dayna got time to process the fact they were all still alive. “...Well done,” she told Oron.

He shrugged. “Old trick, getting your enemies to blast each other instead of you. Nothing special.”

If Tarrant had pulled something like that off, he would have gloated for hours. He was like that. “Still, more than I'd expect a service worker to know,” Vila mused. “I didn't think you could fly the thing at all. I know I couldn't.”

Dayna didn't think of that – she wasn't really familiar with how Earth's economy worked. On Sarran, her father had provided all she would ever need, and she was grateful. Oron sighed, looking decidedly uncomfortable, as if he'd revealed something he didn't really want to. “I wasn't always a service worker,” he said. “I trained at the FSA.”

The acronym was vaguely familiar to Dayna – that's where Tarrant learned, wasn't it? – but she thought no more of it. Vila, on the other hand, seemed rather startled by this information. “Really? I didn't think they let Deltas in.” He paused. “You are a Delta, right? I mean, I assumed, but...”

“No, I'm a Delta born and bred,” said Oron. He didn't sound very happy about it. Dayna was familiar with the grade system back on Earth, more or less – she knew Avon and Tarrant were both Alphas, whereas Vila was a Delta. However she didn't really know what that meant. “But they bumped me up to Beta when I did my aptitude test, after they saw my flight test scores. And knocked me back down when they kicked me out.”

Dayna blinked. Well, that explained why he was a grunt on a ship like this, but there still seemed to be something missing from that story. If Oron showed enough potential as a pilot they would promote him two grades, why would they then pass him over?

“Why did they kick you out?” she asked, as gently as she could.

Oron scoffed. “Moral deviancy, would you believe?”

That only left Dayna more confused, wondering what exactly that meant, but Vila pulled a face like he knew exactly what it meant. “What, from the FSA?” he asked. “Come on, if they kicked out everyone who was fooling about with other lads the Federation would have no pilots left. At least, that's what I heard.”

Dayna frowned. Clearly, Vila knew a lot more about this place than she did – she would ask Tarrant about it, if she and Tarrant were speaking.

Oron chuckled. “That's what I said,” he murmured.

It still seemed like there was something he wasn't telling them, but maybe it was none of her business. “So, the FSA taught you how to do that?” she asked, hoping she might distract them a little.

“Not exactly,” he said, and then sighed sadly. “A friend of mine. Bullet. He taught me that trick – thought he was the first to ever come up with it too.” He rolled his eyes, but fondly, somehow.

“Silly name,” Dayna said, unthinking.

“Well of course it wasn't his real name, but – that's what I always called him.”

Vila gave Dayna a look. She suspected they were thinking the same thing – she wasn't going to mention it, but he awkwardly piped up: “So uh, this Bullet... was he just a friend then?”

But Oron didn't take offense; no, he laughed again. “Well depends who you ask,” he said. “It is how it is: I was is in love, he thought I was an amusing teenage dalliance on his way to a long career in the service, a computer-selected compatible wife and two and a half children to carry on the family tradition. You know what those Alpha grades are like.”

Dayna wasn't sure she did, but Vila nodded like he knew all too well. A natural lull fell in their conversation then, giving Dayna time to realise something.

“Hang on, have they stopped attacking us?”

Just then, a voice came from her wrist. “Dayna.”

“Avon!” Dayna pulled the communicator to her mouth hurriedly, surprised how delighted she was to hear him. “Our communicators couldn't get through, and then we came under attack! What's happening?”

“Three Federation cruisers. Either they followed us here, or they were waiting all along.” Dayna grimaced. She didn't like the sound of either of those options. “I think Servalan used something to prevent our signals getting through while she attacked – now she's stopped, so has that. Tarrant is stalling them, but you have to teleport back quickly.”

“You're the one who can do that, Avon,” she said, but while she was readying herself to be beamed up Vila spoke:

“Hang on, we can't just go,” he said, which was odd – usually he was the first to run at any sign of trouble. “We found someone here, a survivor. We need an extra bracelet.”

Dayna cursed – in her haste she had forgotten about Oron, and he had saved both their lives. They couldn't just abandon him.

On the other end of the line, Avon hesitated only a moment. “Alright,” he said, which seemed awfully easy. Most likely, he thought they'd spend more time arguing over whether they could leave this man behind than it would take to come rescue him as well. “I'll beam across with an extra bracelet. Be prepared to leave the moment I arrive.”

Vila clutched his bracelet like he was scared it would fall off. Within seconds, Avon was there – he really wasn't kidding about being in a hurry. He didn't bother to introduce himself before slapping a bracelet around Oron's wrist, instead barking into the communicator: “Soolin, now!”

Like that, they were gone.

* * *

Servalan's ship was overwhelmingly white. It was difficult to tell the floor from the walls from the ceiling unless you looked closely, and all in all it added to make the space seem bigger than it really was, enough to make anyone feel small and insignificant.

Servalan herself was right in front of him, a glass table that shone through to the pure white below. She was the only thing in this space that wasn't white. She wore a long black gown, different to the one she'd worn on Virn – this one did not sparkle, and opposed being hoisted on one arm, the dress had long flowing sleeves that nonetheless left her shoulders entirely bare, as if it might just slip off.

Standing before this black widow in a white room, Tarrant felt rather like he'd been caught in a spider's web. He supposed that was the point.

“Ah, Tarrant.” Servalan grinned in a way that could be seductive, could be savage, depending how optimistic you were. “Good. I was hoping you'd come. Would you like a drink?”

Atop the table were two glasses, full of a bubbling yellow liquid – champagne presumably, that or poison. “No thank you, not while I'm working.”

“Shame,” she said, and took a sip herself, as if that was meant to convince him – Tarrant wasn't _that_ easily fooled, however.

It seemed as if all the vulnerability he had seen on Virn had disappeared – did that mean it was all a lie? Or was this the lie? “Well, Servalan, what do you want?” he asked, as brusque and as businesslike as he could possibly muster.

She grinned at him. “Oh, didn't I make it clear? We have unfinished business, Tarrant.”

As she prowled closer, Tarrant averted his eyes, strangely bashful. She was playing to his vanity, she had to be. One wondered what she thought she stood to win. He laughed. “Come now, Servalan, you didn't bring me all this way just to seduce me.” _Again,_ he didn't add.

Servalan raised her brows. “Oh, didn't I?”

“If _that_ was what you wanted, I'm sure you have no shortage of young men at your beck and call, just as young, handsome, and... enthusiastic, who could satisfy your needs with considerably less trouble on everyone's part.” She grinned at him. Apparently, he did know her a little after all. “No, you must want something only I could possibly give you. Now what could that possibly be?”

“Oh, Tarrant,” she sighed dramatically. “You disappoint me. I never had you down as one to lack confidence.”

* * *

Given the rush Avon was in, Dayna expected to teleport back to a Scorpio in crisis; that the Federation having decided to leave the first ship alone was no reason to leave them alone, and they would have to run for it, fast.

But no, everything on the flight deck was perfectly still, Scorpio having apparently been spared all that laser fire. Indeed, everything seemed completely normal, with one glaring exception:

“Where's Tarrant?”

“On Servalan's ship,” said Soolin, next to an empty pilot's chair. Dayna gawped. “That was her price for calling off the attack. God knows what she's going to do with him.”

Dayna turned to Avon. “And you let him go?!” He didn't answer, but he didn't look proud of his decision either. What was Dayna afraid of? That Tarrant would betray them? That he would fuck Servalan? That she would kill him? She wasn't sure, but she knew she had to– “I'm going after him.”

“I thought you might,” Avon got to his feet coolly, leaving her a little unsettled. “And I'm coming with you. I had no intention of leaving him over there in her clutches. I suspect, no matter what happens, none of us would be better off for that. Especially not Tarrant.”

“...Right.” Dayna felt slightly annoyed. Trust Avon never to tell them when he had a plan. “Well, we still have our bracelets on. Are you ready to go?”

He nodded, and Vila coughed awkwardly behind them. “Er, you don't need us to–?”

“You can stay here, Vila,” Dayna said. He would only get in the way in any case. “Help our new guest get acquainted.”

Oron had been watching them, stoically, not betraying at all the fact he must have had no idea what was going on. Soolin, who had been similar polite throughout this episode, raised her eyebrows to ask _and who is this then?_ , and Vila grinned at her. “Ah. Right. Soolin, this is Videl. Videl Oron.”

Soolin nodded, and Dayna decided it was safe to ignore the pleasantries. “Beam us across,” said Avon, and dragged from the introductions, Soolin hit the button. With a shiver, they were flying through space again.


	6. Chapter 6

“Alright, Servalan, you've played enough games,” said Tarrant, although he'd never known her to stop doing so just because of that. “We both know you could have killed us all if you wanted to. Which means you don't want to. Which means you want _something_ , so tell me what it is and we can all get on with our lives.”

It wasn't very convincing, but Servalan must have been getting impatient too, because after a moment she sighed and shrugged. “Very well.” She put her glass aside and took a seat on the couch. “If you must know, I'm looking for a man. I thought you might help me find him. Videl Oron.” At Tarrant's look of shock and realisation, she grinned. “What, didn't you think I was listening?”

Before Tarrant had time to respond (although he had no idea _how_ to respond), a sound emanated behind him, distracting them both. “Ah,” said Servalan. “It seems, my dear, we have guests.”

“Don't move.”

“Dayna!” Tarrant was relieved to see her alive and well, by Avon's side, gun pointed directly at Servalan's face. He was less relieved that the gun was also, by necessity, pointed rather close to him, but needs must.

“Well hello,” said Servalan, acting completely nonchalant to have someone intrude upon their little rendezvous. “I did think you might be joining us, Avon. I'm afraid I didn't put out an extra glass however. I didn't want to make Tarrant jealous – boys his age can be a little impetuous, don't you find?”

Tarrant felt himself turning embarrassingly red. He had not been a boy to her – at least, not until Avon showed up to put him into perspective. Avon smiled slightly. “He can, certainly,” he said. “But somehow I doubt that's the only reason you seem less than thrilled to see us.”

Dayna seemed understandably annoyed that Servalan was ignoring her, given she was the one with the gun. “What do you want with him?” she asked, which Tarrant thought was a very good question, if he was increasingly sure he wasn't going to get a straight answer.

“Oh, no more than you do, I'm sure,” Servalan blinked. “Perhaps we could come to some sort of arrangement?”

Dayna tightened her grip on the trigger. “Oh I could kill you right now,” she said. “That would sort it out.”

Servalan chuckled. “Oh no,” slowly, she removed something from her gown – a small silver box, totally inconspicuous. “I don't think you will.”

They all stopped. Stared. The box itself didn't seem to indicate much of anything, but Servalan revealed it like it was a deadly threat, and that was enough to make anyone feel threatened. “What is it?” Dayna eventually asked.

“Microgrenade remote detonator,” said Servalan, not missing a beat, then she turned to Tarrant. “What? Did you think I'd leave you without a memento of our time together?”

Tarrant's stomach sunk as he belatedly realised what he was doing here – he had been taken hostage without even noticing. Hurriedly he started to pat down his clothing.

“Oh, you won't find it that way,” she said. “I'm afraid it's – how should I put this? – somewhere rather delicate.”

He stopped, burning red again. Servalan winked at him and then looked over his shoulder to Dayna. “Why don't you put the gun away dear?” she asked. “It's making me rather nervous. I would hate it if my finger slipped, and then...”

Tarrant looked back at her. _Don't do it, don't give her what she wants,_ he thought, but sure enough Dayna's gun slowly slid back by her side.

“So, you've lured us all over her, and have Tarrant's life in your hands to make us comply with your will.” Tarrant shuddered. He couldn't imagine Avon being willing to sacrifice himself to Servalan for his sakes somehow. “But why? What are you looking for?”

_Oron,_ thought Tarrant with a flinch of guilt. He should never have mentioned him, but he hardly thought she would care – why did she care? What did Oron have to do with anything?

“Come now Avon, that would be rather giving the game away, wouldn't it?” Slowly, she stood back up. “You're clever, I'm sure you'll figure it out. In time. Speaking of time, I'm afraid I'm rather busy,” she said. “You might want to return to your ship now. I assure you, my men will give you no trouble leaving.”

“Oh, well as long as we have your word for it, that's alright then,” Tarrant couldn't help but jibe at her.

Servalan stopped, and raised her eyebrow. “I let you go once, didn't I?” she asked. Yes, she did. Tarrant was getting increasingly confused what to make of that. “Oh, don't sulk. The least you could do is kiss my goodbye.”

He really shouldn't have been surprised by that, but he was, surprised enough he didn't see it coming when she kissed him instead. Instinctively his eyes closed, and her lips felt soft and lush against his own. Still, he didn't kiss her back this time. Not really anyway.

She pulled away from him with an expectant look, and Tarrant sighed, extracted himself from her body, and made his way back over to Dayna and Avon. They, understandably, looked less than impressed.

“Well, shall we?” he asked, sticking out it wrist to show he was still wearing his teleport bracelet.

Avon nodded, raising his communicator to his mouth. “Soolin, bring us up.”

* * *

“So is this a normal day for you lot, then?”

Vila and Soolin shared a look in response to Videl's question.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Vila said, and Videl sighed.

“Brilliant.”

Vila gave him a sympathetic smile, but that didn't stop them falling into another awkward silence. After all the introductions had been made, there wasn't a lot to do but sit around and wait for the others. Vila thought it was stupid, beaming over to Servalan's ship – he thought it was stupid for Tarrant to have done it, and would have said as much had he been there, but that was Tarrant all over; he was almost proud of his recklessness. Avon following him over was a lot less explicable.

Thankfully, a voice came over to save them fairly soon. “Soolin, beam us up.”

Soolin, who had started to zone out a bit, was shaken back to life. “Avon?” She realised he hadn't made her wait for the command this time, and so she pushed the lever, and three bodies reappeared in a whoosh.

Tarrant looked no worse for wear for all the trouble he'd put them through. _Typical._ Still, if they had a guest, Vila thought he ought to be polite. “Ah, Tarrant, there you are. Well this is–”

“Oron.”

Tarrant had frozen where he stood, staring at Videl like he was seeing a ghost. Videl looked much the same. Vila looked between the two of them, confused.

“You two know each other, then?”

Of course Tarrant ignored him, suddenly breaking into that obnoxious grin of his, rushing over to say hello to this not-so-stranger. “I thought it might be you,” he said, sounding thrilled about it. “I thought I recognised that manoeuvre. What are you doing all the way out here? I-I thought I'd never see you again. It's been a long time, huh? Oh well, I suppose that means we have a lot to catch up on.”

Videl didn't respond, not as first. Slowly, his brows knotted together, puzzled, and his jaw set into a slight frown. Tarrant didn't seem to notice it, extending his hand toward Videl's own, and Videl–

_Thwack!_

Punched him in the face.

_Huh, knew I liked him for a reason,_ thought Vila.


	7. Chapter 7

Tarrant was left clutching his jaw, looking up in shock and bewilderment, apparently completely stunned by this man not being thrilled to see him. Typical, really. Instinctively Dayna surged forth to help him, but Avon held her back. He somehow seemed to know, though god knows how, that this altercation was personal, not political.

“What the hell was that for?” Tarrant asked. Fair question, really.

Videl glowered at him, eyes burning with a long-held resentment. “Do you really not know?” he asked, coldly, and Tarrant shook his head. That only seemed to make Videl angrier. “No, I don't suppose you do. Why would you? Why would you ever have thought about it?” He huffed. “I suppose I'll have to fill you in, will I?”

Now standing straight again, Tarrant raised his eyebrows expectantly, waiting for him to do just that. Videl turned and folded his arms. Vila noted the gesture made him look very young. “You got me kicked out of the FSA,” he said, which left Tarrant even more confused. “After you deserted. It was quite a big deal, after all, the Federation's latest wunderkind, captain at twenty-three, one of those bloody Tarrants – everyone wanted to know why you'd done it. So they went poking about in your past. And what do you think they found?”

While Tarrant struggled to connect the dots, Vila was connecting some dots of his own. “Bullet. Lead bullet. Led. _Del_.”

Everyone gave him looks then, and Vila retreated to the background sheepishly. He hadn't quite meant to say that aloud. Avon and Soolin just looked puzzled, but Dayna, she was clearly putting it together too – and blushing. If Tarrant was Bullet, then he was Videl's lost-love-stroke-teenage-fling, depending who you ask, then he was...

Vila started to feel like he shouldn't be watching this, but of course Tarrant was too stubborn to take this conversation somewhere private, where it clearly belonged. “But – they wouldn't kick you out for _that_ ,” he insisted, turning a bit pink himself. “It was the FSA! Everyone was–”

“ _Everyone_ was, yes,” Videl sneered. “You and all your Alpha grade buddies, you knew you had nothing to worry about, no-one was stupid enough to try prosecuting _you_ for moral deviancy, no matter how obvious you were. And you were more reckless than most. But me? The over-promoted Delta who must have been feeding you sedition all along, why else would their golden boy have turned on them? I wasn't so lucky. They wanted me punished, and I was.”

Tarrant was left reeling, for once in his life looking genuinely ashamed. Vila didn't find it as satisfying a sight as he would have imagined. “I'm sorry,” he mumbled, dumb. “I didn't realise.”

Videl laughed bitterly. “No, of course to you didn't.”

“Fascinating as all this personal drama is,” Avon said, thankfully drawing a line under the messy public spat, “I doubt Servalan came all this way for gossip. Currently, I see an abandoned ship, a Federation battle fleet, and you, Videl. Now, can you possibly explain to me how these things are linked together, and what Servalan's interest in them might be?”

Videl blinked. Presumably, he'd gotten so caught up in his drama with Tarrant, he'd forgotten he had to deal with the rest of them – who had different priorities and who might not necessarily trust him. He chewed his lip nervously. “...I'm not sure.”

Well that wasn't much of an answer. He looked like he was wondering what exactly he should tell them, and Tarrant too seemed to be hesitating, before piping up: “Servalan said she was looking for you.”

_When did that happen?_ Videl looked back over his shoulder, surprised by this interjection. After a moment's thinking it over, Videl sighed. “It probably wasn't me specifically she was looking for,” he said. “She just looked at the crew files, and realised someone had survived. She didn't want to leave any witnesses?”

“Witnesses?”

Vila's heart sped up as Avon questioned their guest. Witnesses? To _what_? What had he not told them? Videl turned to him and Dayna in turn, with an apologetic look. “I wasn't lying to you before,” he said. “I think we must have picked up a bad bunch of air in sector 7. I'm just... not sure we were sold it by accident.”

He took a seat behind one of the consoles – Dayna's – as if he belonged there. Tarrant frowned. “Why?”

Videl looked up. “There was this man on board – he didn't seem to be there just for a holiday,” he said. “He claimed he was on that ship because it was the quickest way to some planet or other, where he was going to meet up with a woman, and old trading contact of his – at first I assumed he was just a smuggler; illegal, sure, but nothing for me to worry about.” He paused. “But then he started saying things – not too loudly, mind, just where people like me could hear him – you know, about the Federation. I didn't think anything of it at first, but after he and everyone on board got killed, well... it almost felt like he was recruiting.”

Vila felt queasy. “So what, they took out the whole ship just to get rid of him?” That didn't speak well for their chances.

“And to prevent him fulfilling his mission,” said Avon. “No doubt, the Federation were eager to prevent him handing over a handful of new rebel troops to that woman, and whoever she might be working with.”

“A rebel army?” asked Dayna. “Who would be recruiting one of those?”

“Who indeed,” Avon mused. Vila frowned. Avon had that look he got sometimes, when he knew something you didn't – not exactly a rare occurrence, but still. “But I'm afraid we won't know unless we find them ourselves. Videl, I presume you know where your ship was headed before you were wiped out?”

“Of course I do,” said Videl.

“Then we'll start there.”

“Avon.” Soolin grabbed Avon by the arm, giving him a hard look. She was brave that way. “Are you sure this isn't just another trap?”

Avon grinned at her. “Well of course it is,” he said. “But in this case, the bait may be of extraordinary value to us. Enough to take the risk of being caught.”

_This doesn't add up,_ thought Vila, frowning. He liked to think he knew Avon – although Avon was becoming harder to know by the day – and it wasn't like him to take a leap of faith like that, not unless he knew something was waiting on the other side.

Vila started to wonder just how many people here knew something they weren't telling him.


	8. Chapter 8

Luckily, Soolin was willing to take care of the small matter of a grenade planted on his person, once he explained the situation to her. Tarrant knew she wasn't medically trained, but none of them were, and Soolin had some first aid experience. More than that, she was professional. Tarrant thought he could get through this experience without too many off-colour jokes or withering glares from her, hopefully.

“Is that it?” he asked, disbelieving, as she finally presented the item she'd extracted from his body in front of him. It could fit between two of his fingers, it was that tiny.

“They call them micro for a reason,” said Soolin. Yes, Tarrant knew – Dayna had been able to fit one behind her teeth. He flinched. He'd almost forgotten about his and Dayna's artificial dalliance on Ultraworld, and now seemed like a bad time to remember it. Between Oron and Servalan, he'd start to get a reputation.

He sighed. “So what do with it?” he asked, because keeping a bomb on board, even a small one, hardly seemed like the best idea.

Soolin shrugged. “Whatever you like. I don't think it was ever primed,” she said, to Tarrant's bafflement. “If she had tried to trigger it, I don't think anything would have happened.”

“But why would she do that?!” Tarrant asked. What was the point of planting a bomb on someone if it wasn't going to go off?

“Perhaps she forgot?” Soolin offered. “I presume she was rather distracted at the time.” And Tarrant turned pink remembering what exactly she'd been distracted by. “That, or she really is fond of you.”

* * *

“So these buttons put in the coordinates, and then you push the lever...”

Vila did so, and Videl watched, impressed, as the green stuffed dinosaur he'd taken from Soolin's room and wrapped a bracelet around disappeared in a squiggle of pink light. “Well done,” he said, and Vila beamed. “The mechanism seems a bit complex though. Must be hard to work in an emergency.”

“I've always said so, but the others have never given me much sympathy.” Videl nodded, understanding, and Vila chuckled. “But hey, complex mechanisms are my specialty!”

“I see,” said Videl. “I hope you can get that back then. I don't think I'd like to be around Soolin if she knew we'd sent her toy into the void of space.”

“Relax, I know what I'm doing!” And if worst came to worst, he could always blackmail her with the fact that she, of all people, owned a stuffed toy. “See?” He pushed the lever again and sure enough, the green thing came back into few, no worse for wear.

Videl looked slightly sheepish. “Sorry. Shouldn't have doubted you,” he said.

“No you shouldn't,” Vila grinned, not really offended. “Anyway, that's the teleport. And this...” he got out the box with a theatrical sigh, inserting the key with deep reluctance. “Is Orac.”

Orac buzzed at them irritably. “What is it? I was in the middle of some important research. What menial task do you have for me now?”

“Orac, be nice,” Vila implored, expecting no such thing. “We have a new crewmember. Don't you want to say hello?”

“I don't see why I should,” said Orac. “I have noted the additional presence, and learned all I need to from his Federation records. Everything else is pleasantries, a complete waste of my time.”

Videl shot Vila a look, deeply bemused. “He always like this?”

“Trust me, this is him on a good day.” Videl laughed, and Vila grinned. “Still, at least he's easy to shut up.” He pulled the key back out and Orac thankfully hissed back into silence.

Curiously, Videl observed this also, but then he moved on. “So, is that all you have to show me?”

Vila hesitated. “Well, all I can anyway.” If Videl was such a good pilot it would be a waste not to show him how to fly the ship, and Tarrant would have to do that, and that sounded like it was going to be unpleasant for everybody. Vila didn't know the first thing about piloting. Gan had been alright at it, back in the day. He'd had no experience, but apparently had a natural aptitude. He could have gotten a lot better, but Gan wouldn't have wanted to tread on Jenna's toes.

While he was hesitating he heard someone else enter the room, cutting their conversation short. “Vila,” Avon announced with characteristic swagger. “Videl.” It seemed to take him a second to remember the other man was there. “Would you mind if I had a word with my crewmate in private for a second?”

Videl seemed surprised, but shook his head. “No, don't worry.” He got up and took the dinosaur with him when he left. Vila considered calling out to him that he'd be much better at getting it back to Soolin's room without her noticing, but he didn't want to let on to Avon that he'd been stealing their things again.

Once he was gone Vila was left with Avon looking down at him, and it put him on the defensive. “What?” he asked.

Avon raised an eyebrow. “Our guest seems to have taken quite a shine to you.”

“I like him!”

“Yes, I'd noticed that.” Avon looked faintly amused. Vila wondered if he thought Vila meant he liked him _that_ way – with Videl's interests confirmed the way they were, it wasn't an unfair suspicion to have, but he wasn't, for the record. He'd never been with another man, and he'd been in prison several times. Of course, it wasn't like the thought had never occurred to him. Sometimes he'd thought if he and Gan might... but he'd never mentioned it, and Gan had been unswervingly loyal to the memory of his dead wife, and then he was dead himself, so that was that.

Anyway, the point was Vila had no interest in Videl other than the strictly platonic, he just liked having the fella about, that was all. And it wouldn't have been any of Avon's business if he did.

Not that any of that was relevant anyway. “Regardless, admirable as your attempts to make him feel at home are, I suspect they might be premature. I doubt he'll be staying with us for long.”

“Won't he?”

Avon raised an eyebrow. “I presume after we reach planet Belisi we will drop him off in some neutral nearby space, where he can lay low and put his skills to better use to fixing old junkers. I doubt he's going to want to spend any more time in the line of fire, and we already have at least one pilot.”

_Oh._ Vila had just assumed that when Videl came aboard, he'd be sticking around. That was what usually happened. Soolin had no good reason to be hanging out with them either, but here she was.

It wasn't like Vila could blame Videl if he didn't want to stick around – god only knew he'd been tempted to run for it once or twice – but he knew he wouldn't like it. _Can't we swap them?_ He wanted to ask, because he would rather have Videl about the place than Tarrant, but he knew Tarrant would never stand for that. There was nothing he liked more than being in the line of fire.

“In any case, you ought be cautious,” Avon carried on while Vila sulked. “It's not wise to go explaining our most sensitive technology to a man we've only just met.”

Vila frowned. “ _You_ let Tarrant onto Liberator the day you met him,” he sad.

Avon nodded sagely. “Only after he saved the lives of Dayna and I.”

“Like Videl saved Dayna and me!” Vila paused. “What, don't you trust him?”

At that, Avon grinned. “Vila I don't trust _anyone_ ,” he said. “You can hardly rely on my judgement in these matters.”

_Then what are you our captain for?_ Vila wondered, but Avon walked out before he could ask any more questions. Well, that was weird. If he didn't know better he'd have thought Avon was jealous.

He shook that thought away as soon as it came to him. He knew Avon didn't dislike him as much as he pretended to, but he also knew that Avon thought of him – like everyone – as ultimately expendable.

* * *

Soolin was surprised by a knock on her door. Her crewmates had a tendency to just barge in. “Who is it?” she asked.

“Oron.”

She blinked. She would have to get used to him being here. She got up and opened the door, to see him standing in front of her with a small green lump in hand.

“I believe this is yours?”

Quickly, too quickly to stop herself, she reached to grab it from it. “It is,” she said. “Let me guess: Vila has been stealing again?”

Oron nodded. “He wanted to show me something,” he said, clearly noticing her eagerness to have it back. “But it made it through alright.”

Well, that was something. Soolin carefully placed it aside, as if she wasn't particularly attached to it – foolish, given she'd been dragging it across the galaxy with her for most of her life, but she was always loathe to show weakness, even one as small and petty as this. Especially one as small and petty as this.

However Oron didn't seem at all convinced by her affected nonchalance. “A childhood memento?”

“Something like that.” Her father had saved for weeks to buy them those toys. At the time she hadn't been very grateful – she'd never liked green, growing up surrounded by infinite verdant meadows; she and her sister had both wanted the red one, and she'd sulked for days when Mae won the coin flip.

Oron tilted his head at her curiously. “Forgive me for being rude, but you didn't strike me as the type of person who had a happy childhood.”

Soolin laughed bitterly. “Oh, I had half a very happy childhood.”

He flinched when he realised what that meant. “I'm sorry.”

She shook her head. “It was a long time ago.” He nodded, and Soolin took that as meaning he was about to go, but when he didn't she frowned. “Is there something else?”

Oron hesitated. “...Tarrant,” he said eventually, sounding as if he loathed himself for doing so. “Is he alright?”

Soolin fought back a smirk. “He's fine,” extracting the microgrenade had been awkward and embarrassing for the both of them, but Tarrant would get over it. “I checked his face while I was there as well. You didn't break anything.”

He rapped his knuckles on the doorframe. “Pity.”

She raised her eyebrows. Somehow, she didn't quite believe that. “You know, you could just ask him yourself,” she said, not sure she really wanted to get involved.

Oron scoffed. “That's going to be awkward.”

“It's going to be awkward no matter what you do, you might as well bite the bullet.” She paused. “So to speak.”

He tilted her head at her again. Frankly, she was getting tired of his curiosity. “It doesn't bother you, does it?” he asked. “Me and him? Sorry, I don't mean to bring it up, it's just – in the outer sectors, you can get a bit nervous.”

Soolin chewed her lip. She was used to Earthworlders who thought everyone past sector three was some sort of mindless savage who'd hunt them down with torches and pitchforks, if they didn't kill and eat them. It angered her, vaguely, but she'd seen enough planets herself she knew there was sometimes good reason for the anxiety.

Still, it didn't seem like Earth lacked for pointless cruelty. Indeed, no-one on Gauda Prime would have turned away a talented pilot for where he chose to put his penis – they were too practical of course.

“Don't worry. Officially, my planet is full of hard-working, decent, salt-of-the-earth types, who'd never fall to such decadent corruption.” She grinned. “Unofficially, when you have to walk two miles to find anyone who isn't your first cousin or closer, you're not very picky about your sexual partners. People are just relieved you're not doing it with the farm animals.”

Oron laughed at that, and she laughed with him until she realised she'd slipped again. Talking about Gauda Prime like it still existed. Of course, the planet still existed, but it wasn't the one she'd grown up on anymore, the world of green fields, nervous sheep, and stuffed toy dinosaurs.

Soolin knew it was long gone. She hadn't even seen it since she was a child. And yet sometimes...

She stepped backwards. “I'm sorry. I'm feeling rather tired,” she lied, reaching to smooth the sheets on her bunk. She knew she was overselling it, but well, Mae was always the actress in the family. “I might get some sleep.”

He nodded at her. “Oh, of course.” He walked off and the door slid closed behind him, Soolin watching him go as Donna the Dinosaur watched over her. She still wasn't sure what she made of him. Mostly, he made her think the same thing most of her crewmates did – that Earth was a very strange place.


	9. Chapter 9

“Ah, I was looking for you.”

Tarrant sighed deeply as Avon came up to him in the corridor. That was just what he needed at this particular point in time. Still, he knew better than to defy Avon when he thought it was time to impose his will – well, alright, no he didn't, but he would always stick around to defy him to his face – and so he stood still waiting for whatever snide comment absolutely could not wait.

He did think Avon was getting rather close to him, suspiciously close even, but then again, it was Avon. He could be like that sometimes. “I think, once we've reached Belisi and found what we will there, we should find a heist to occupy our time.” Tarrant's eyes raised in surprised. Not that he was opposed to material wealth, and certainly nor was Avon, but it didn't seem like the sort of thing he'd be thinking about right now. “It seems our resident thief is getting antsy, and looking for things to steal. Namely, your boyfriend.”

 _Oh._ Tarrant gritted his teeth together. He didn't particularly want to have this conversation, especially not with Avon, but he couldn't back down now the challenge had been issued. “He's not my boyfriend.”

“Ex-boyfriend then.”

“He's not that either.” Avon didn't look very convinced. Tarrant didn't sound very convincing. “He's... an old friend, that's all.”

“Yes, well, I've had multiple orgasms over a period of years with all my friends.”

Tarrant flushed, wondering how exactly the details had gotten back to Avon. Vila, most likely. “It was the FSA, things are different there,” he insisted. “It was boyhood experimentation, nothing more.” Avon gave him a look that reeked of condescension, that sneered _if you say so._

It wasn't like Tarrant was lying. Yes, he and Oron had been close, intimately close, but that was what happened when you put two adolescent boys in a room together and put all the female trainee pilots in a separate campus on the other side of the dome. They'd both known it couldn't last forever, and they'd never done anything that was technically meant to be added to their medical records, so why should it be this big defining factor as to who he was?

 _It was for Oron,_ Tarrant remembered uncomfortably. If not for him, Oron would be a Federation pilot right now, probably their best pilot, if Tarrant himself wasn't providing competition. They would be enemies. Tarrant felt ridiculously hurt at the thought – ridiculous, because they weren't exactly getting along swimmingly now.

“I wonder,” said Avon, cool as always, dragging him back to reality, “if you ever told him that?”

Tarrant flinched, and couldn't help his eyes drifting through the corridor and into the console room, where Vila and Oron were sitting and chatting, again. If Vila liked Oron, and if Oron's interest in men was less experimental than his own, what of it? Why should it bother him? He'd caused Oron enough pain, and Vila would probably say he'd done the same for him. No, he wished them well.

After all, in many ways they were well matched. They were both sly, creative, clever in their own way, not over-encumbered with heroic spirit, but rather charming to a sheltered young Alpha grade with dreams of crossing the stars – at least, Oron was. Vila's charm was rather theoretical to him, but presumably it worked for someone.

“...He must have known.”

Avon nodded, said nothing, and Tarrant felt worse than if he'd said anything at all. “Regardless, that's not the point,” he carried on. “I just hope you can trust this man. Whether your feelings are romantic or platonic, I would rather they not lead to our ship being stolen by a man we cannot trust.”

Tarrant bristled, not sure if he was more wounded by the slight on his judgement (although he could only be so offended, given recent events) or Oron's character. “I trust him.”

“A bruise on your jawline suggests you shouldn't.”

He clasped the spot on his face where Oron had punched him. He'd almost forgotten about that. “Look, even if Oron despises me, he'd never betray me. I know him better than that.”

Avon nodded again. _If you say so._

Tarrant flared with anger. “You're the one insisting we fly halfway across the galaxy entirely on his word! Why would you do that if you don't trust him?”

That seemed to get under Avon's skin. He averted his eyes, stepping to the side defensively. “I think it's a risk worth taking.”

“But why? What do you think is waiting for us on Belisi?”

“I don't think _you_ are in much of a position to be asking questions, given your recent behaviour,” Avon turned and snapped at him, in that interminably haughty tone that made Tarrant feel like he was back at the academy. “Let me worry about Belisi. Get on with your day. If your piloting is required, I will inform you, although you may have backup waiting.”

Tarrant sighed. It was obvious he'd been dismissed. “Fine,” he huffed, uncharacteristically compliant, but he had no wish to join Vila and Oron on the flight deck where they were enjoying each other's company anyway.

* * *

“So, if you and Tarrant went to school together, how come you were still at the FSA while he was flying the stars and being given pursuit ships to steal?”

Videl chuckled. “You can get very far ahead at the FSA, complete the course in half the time, by being the number one – and he was always just a whisker ahead of me.” Vila pulled a face. Oh, of course. “He never had worries about whether his family were eating to distract him from his studies. No, their connections only helped him. Oh, and that closet case Jarvik got to pick who he wanted as his lieutenant, and chose the prettiest boy in the class, _that_ sure helped.”

Vila laughed. Sure, he wouldn't do anything with the information, but it was reassuring to know Tarrant's skill as a pilot wasn't entirely god-given.

Videl paused. “I think his family wanted to get him away from me as well,” he said. “Or his brother did. He never liked me. Thought I was going to lead him astray.”

That made Vila frown. _Did he?_ Granted, he'd never actually met Deeta Tarrant, but from what he'd heard about the fella that sounded pretty out of character. And didn't Tarrant say his brother had left Earth years before him anyway?

“Well, for what it's worth, I think you can do better,” said Vila, cheerfully distracting him. Videl gave him a curious look. “Er, in a strictly platonic, avuncular way, that is. But really. A man who threatens to abandon you at the next planet you find isn't the sort of man you can build a life around.”

Videl blinked, no less confused by that. Vila cursed himself. Of course, what reason did Videl have to know about that? “I-It was something he said to me once,” he explained, “about a year ago. He said he was sorry afterwards, but...”

Videl frowned. “That doesn't sound like him.”

“Well, it happened.” Tarrant was nothing if not consistently inconsistent, and Vila had long since given up trying to keep track of it all.

“Hmm.” Vila waited for Videl to give him more of a response than that, but he said nothing. Perhaps he was hoping Videl would tell him that was an entirely reasonable thing to cause an ongoing resentment, or he would say Vila was overreacting and should get over it, but he'd say something at least.

He wasn't sure why he still held such a grudge over that. It was cruel, sure, but many things were cruel, and this one he'd actually got an apology for. Besides, it all worked out in the end, and they'd barely known each other at the time.

Maybe that was the problem. He hadn't known Tarrant well – he hadn't liked him up until that point, but he hadn't necessarily disliked him either. He remembered how Tarrant had nobly, pointlessly gone to fetch him when they thought he'd died in the vacuum of space, and he thought _well, he must think I'm worth something. Even my dead body is worth something._ But he didn't. He was just another smug alpha prick who thought Vila was entirely disposable, would throw him aside for a handful of crystals, and moreover assumed everyone else felt the same.

He'd been caught in the trap of thinking Tarrant was their new Blake. But Blake would never have done that.

Videl wasn't looking at him, instead staring into the starry night ahead. Vila didn't know what he was thinking about, and it made him uneasy. He was tempted to go fetch a drink.

But he didn't. He didn't want his new friend thinking he was a drunk.

* * *

Dayna, somewhat uncharacteristically, was doing her best to stay out of everyone's way. Things were awkward enough on bored, with Avon fixated on something he wouldn't tell them, Tarrant and Oron working through years of worth of tension in isolation, and Vila having commandeered a new best friend shamelessly. At least she and Soolin were getting on as normal, but none of their problems could be shot at, which put them decidedly out of their area of expertise.

Oron wasn't like Servalan, a vicious mass-murderer who killed her father. No, he was a good man who saved her life, so Dayna realised she had only one reason to be so bitter about his being aboard. She was jealous. Stupidly, pathetically jealous. But under the circumstances, she doubted anyone would have patience with a bratty girl sulking because the boy she liked didn't like her back, hence the staying out of everyone's way.

But Scorpio wasn't a ship were you _could_ stay out of everyone's way for very long. Indeed she and Oron kept bumping into each other, and after the third or so time he stated bluntly: “You're avoiding me.”

“I'm not avoiding you.” At his flatly disbelieving look, she sighed. “I'm avoiding everyone.”

That made him laugh, and broke the ice a bit. “I'm sorry, I suppose this is... surprising, for you. Me and Tarrant–”

“Oh no, why should that surprise me?” She couldn't help some of her bitterness steeping into her voice. “It seems like he'd sleep with anybody. Boys, girls, mass-murderers – why should anything he does be any surprise?”

Crap. She really hadn't meant to rant like that. She snapped her jaw shut, while Oron examined her for a long moment, then pulled a sympathetic face.

“You too, huh?”

She sighed. “Am I really that obvious?” She leant against the wall sullenly, and he followed. “Sorry. I don't mean to be petty. Believe me, I realise it's hardly the biggest problem anyone has to worry about right now. It's just – I don't exactly have much experience in this sort of thing, I don't know what I'm doing. That's always stressful.”

“So it is.” Oron smiled at her fondly, understandingly – it was almost like having an older brother to confide in. Not that she'd ever had a brother, but she could imagine. “If it makes you feel better, I wouldn't give up just yet. You're exactly his type.”

“Am I?” Dayna didn't believe it. She didn't think Tarrant really had a type – and if he did, any type that included Servalan wasn't one she was eager to fall under. “What's his type then?”

“People who are tough and brash on the outside, but have a vulnerable streak underneath,” said Oron. “Someone he can play the gallant heroic knight to, but also treat as a partner and equal. He wants everything, does Bullet.”

Hmm. Dayna wasn't sure she entirely believed that – she wouldn't have called Piri tough, or Servalan vulnerable. Except. _It was a ploy, to gain my sympathy in a nervous situation._ Maybe Oron had a point after all.

“What about you?” she asked. “Are you his type then?”

Oron laughed. “God, no,” he said. Then he paused and thought it over. “It wouldn't surprise me if he thought I was, though. That's him all over. Always seeing the world the way he wants it to be.”


	10. Chapter 10

“Since when do you drink?”

Dayna jumped before she remembered that wasn't her father, and anyway she was a legal adult (for whatever that meant to a bunch of outlaws) and had every right to have a drink if she felt like it. She turned around to see Vila staring at her curiously, and bristled. “I don't usually get a chance! You go through it before anyone else gets a look in.” That made him sulk a bit, and she sighed. “Do you want one?”

Vila hesitated – oddly – before saying “sure, why not?” Dayna poured another glass, taking her regular seat on the flight deck. Vila sat next to her. She tried not to grimace as she sipped and the burn hit her throat. Alright, maybe Vila had a point – she wasn't exactly an experienced drinker. Father didn't care for alcohol, or anything mind-altering (in hindsight, Dayna could understand why), and it wasn't worth the effort of acquiring it anyway. Justin had had a supply while he was there to tutor her, but he had never shared with her – probably for the best, really.

Now she thought about it, she hadn't seen Vila without a drink in his hand for this long for... well, awhile. She wasn't sure what to make of that. “Your boyfriend's not joining us, then?”

Vila chuckled. “Videl's in bed. Alone, allegedly.”

Dayna tilted her head curiously. “Why do you call him that?”

“Call him what?”

“Videl.”

Vila blinked. “Because that's his name?”

“That's his first name,” Dayna said. “The others all call him Oron. Why?” Dayna herself wasn't that sure what to call him, and so was following the crowd, but what do you do when the crowd can't agree?

With a vague smirk, Vila took another sip of his drink. “Why do you call me Vila?” Then it was Dayna's turn to blink. Why did she call Vila Vila? It sounded silly to ask. _Because that's your name,_ but she realised the sort of response that would get.

“...Because that's what everyone calls you,” she said.

“See?” Vila chuckled. _No?_ At her look of incomprehension, he sighed. “Look, Videl's a Delta, same as me. We call each other by our first names. Everyone calls us by our first names. That's just how things are,” he said. “Now, Avon and Tarrant, they're different – they're Alpha grade. When they call each other their last names, that's a mark of respect. They can't stand each other, but they're still – different. Special. _Better_.”

“...Right.” Dayna thought this was meant to be an explanation, but it left her more confused than ever. “So how come Tarrant calls him Oron, then?”

“Well, he's still thinking of him as a boy from the FSA, isn't he? Just like him. Trust me, Avon would call him his first name if he could be bothered to talk to him at all.”

“And Soolin?”

At that, Vila shrugged. “Well, she's an off-worlder, isn't she? Maybe they do things differently there.”

Maybe they did. Dayna was mostly an off-worlder, after all, and there was a lot about this she didn't follow, staring as Vila took a long gulp from his drink. Did he want her to call him by his last name? She wasn't sure she remembered it, truth be told.

Suddenly she thought: “Hang on, you call _me_ by my first name,” she pointed out.

Vila grinned. “Ah, but you're a lady. You'd get offended if I didn't refer to you by first name. It different for you.” Dayna raised her eyebrows. _Is it?_ No-one had told her that, but then again, no-one had told her much. Then, he gave her a puzzled frown. “What is your grade classification anyway?”

Dayna blinked again. “I – don't think I have one.”

“Everyone has one,” Vila scoffed. “Alright, you never sat your formal classification exams, but you still born on Earth, you would have been given your dad's grade then. So what was he?”

“I don't know.” Vila stared at her in disbelief. But father always told her that sort of thing – the Federation's rigid rules and regulations for how its citizens could live their lives – was what they had come to Sarran to escape. It was true, if hardly the full story. “He said it didn't matter!”

Vila thought this over for a moment, then nodded. “Probably an Alpha grade.”

“How do you figure that?”

“They're the only ones who can afford to think it doesn't matter.”

Dayna bristled defensively. “My father was a good man!”

“I never said he wasn't!” Vila protested, and took another drink. He was being braver than usual tonight. “I'm just saying, when you grow up at the top of the food chain, you don't always notice the same things others do. That's all.”

Her jaw dropped open. She wanted to argue, but found herself struck dumb. Maybe Vila had a point. She loved her father, but he infuriated her sometimes. With the Sarrans, he was never willing to do what needed to be done. He didn't respect them enough to think they were a valid threat. He thought he could treat them like animals, that they would be scared off by his magic, that they wouldn't be smart enough to realise what they were doing. Father made the mistake that primitive meant stupid. Dayna, half a primitive herself, wouldn't do the same.

It was Father's mistake, but Lauren who paid for it. Lauren...

“I know plenty of things you don't, Vila,” she murmured, not entirely sure what she meant.

He sighed. “I don't doubt you do.” Dayna smiled to herself. You could say one thing for her upbringing – it was rather unique. “That's life, isn't it? All of us in our own little bubbles, never able to understand the world as others see it.”

She watched as he took another long gulp, thinking some more. “Alright,” she turned on her side to face him. “If you're such a man of the world, tell me this: why would the Federation care that Tarrant and Oron were sleeping together?” When Vila started coughing, she couldn't help but smirk. “I mean, I know _why_ , because they're both men. But I don't see why it matters. I mean, what difference does it make to whether someone can pilot a ship or not?”

Once Vila had recovered, he looked a bit bemused, like he was thinking about it for the first time. “I don't really know,” he admitted. “Just the way things have always been, I guess. Never saw the point of it myself. Each to his own, and all that.”

“Well that was helpful,” Dayna drawled.

He laughed. “Sorry. It's probably something about keeping people in line, making sure they're looking over their shoulders, giving them someone to hate whose not the Federation – if Blake were here, he'd explain it to you properly. Whether you wanted him to or not.”

A fond smile spread across his face then, which slowly disappeared as he stared into the void ahead. It was as if he'd only just realised that Blake wasn't just not here – he'd been _not here_ for a long time.

Dayna was curious again. “You miss him, don't you?”

She'd never met Blake, but from what she'd heard about him she imagined him something like her father. Warm. Certain. Strong. No wonder Avon had been so desperate to find him on Terminal.

“I miss all of them,” said Vila, honest, with every drop of humour falling from his face. “Blake. Jenna. Cally. Gan.” Dayna flinched at the sound of Cally's name, then frowned as she tried to remember who Gan was. She knew she'd been told about him, but the memories wouldn't come. Vila finished the rest of his drink hastily. “I really miss Gan.”

When he slammed the glass onto the console and reached to refill his glass, Dayna, instinctively, grabbed his hand and squeezed it. She might not really know who Gan was, or why he meant so much to Vila, but she could do this at least.

Vila gave her a look. “How much have you been drinking?” he asked, and suddenly he was smiling again.

“Not enough, so don't try anything.”

* * *

“What are you doing in my seat?”

Oron looked up at him, surprised, but thought better of making excuses. “Sorry. There's only one pilot's chair,” he said. “I thought, if I'm going to be on board for awhile, I should get familiar with the controls, in case of an emergency. I'm afraid I've not flown a junker like this before. Been on one, sure, but not flown.”

Tarrant frowned. Part of him wanted to ask when Oron had been on a junker like Scorpio, but he realised the answer was probably 'during the last five years, when we didn't see each other', so it was a waste of time.

_Well, damn._ He'd hoped to get some of his nerves out working out manoeuvres while Slave took them toward Belisi, but he couldn't do that with Oron here.

“Anyway, I couldn't sleep.”

Tarrant frowned. “Still have trouble with that, do you?” He slid into Soolin's spot – it didn't fit Oron always suffered from insomnia – _you worry too much,_ Tarrant used to tell him. Still, he was rather good at getting Oron off to sleep – er, no pun intended.

“Apparently.”

He bit his lip. He couldn't help but imagine what he might have offered once to help out with this little problem – a massage, or a kiss, or something more. Just as a favour between friends. But that would be very inappropriate now, for multiple reasons. Not least which was, they weren't friends anymore.

Oron sighed heavily. “How long can it take to reach this stupid planet, anyway?”

“I'm going as fast as I can!” Okay, Slave was doing most of the actual work, but Tarrant was still this ship's pilot, and his pride felt slighted. “We do have the fastest stardrive known to mankind. Belisi is just awhile away. Anyway, you were on a cruise there, so I presume you've still reduced your journey time.”

Amused by his outburst – Tarrant realised belatedly he was acting just like he used to – Oron nodded. “True, but how much longer do you think we can spend awkwardly avoiding each other?”

Ah. That it was, the elephant in the room. Tarrant thought it over a moment. “Not sure. Given we're talking right now, I wouldn't say much longer.”

And suddenly they were both laughing, as they might have done years ago, and Tarrant couldn't help grinning by his side. Then he stopped. For a second, he'd forgotten everything Oron had told him when he first boarded.

“You know, you're being awfully friendly for a man who despises me.”

Oron rolled his eyes. “I don't despise you. I'm angry at you. There is a difference.”

“Is there?”

“Just because you're used to being everyone's golden boy all the time–”

Tarrant laughed. “Oh, I haven't been anyone's golden boy for a long time.” He paused while Oron gave him a piercing look. This conversation was going places he didn't want it to. “Anyway, how's Vila?”

Oron looked surprised. “Vila? Last time I checked he was asleep.” _Figures,_ Tarrant thought automatically, even though it was the middle of the night, even if Vila wasn't Vila, you'd expect him to be asleep. “He and Dayna were drinking together. Should be alright in the morning, though.”

“Of course he was,” Tarrant sighed. “Hopefully he's not a bad influence on her.” When Oron stared at him, baffled, he had to explain: “Vila drinks rather a lot.”

“Does he? I hadn't noticed.” And Tarrant wondered how anyone could not notice that, but before he could ask Oron had a question of his own. “Did you really threaten to abandon him on the first planet you came across?”

Tarrant flinched. He should have realised that would come up. “I didn't _mean_ it,” he said, and it sounded like the feeble excuse it was. “I just – we needed those crystals. I was trying to be the cold, hard, mercenary type, the sort of man who'll do anything he needs to to survive.” At Oron's raised brow, he sighed. “I felt awful afterwards. And the others set me right. Anyway, he saved a whole civilisation and got laid for it, so what's he complaining about?”

Oron laughed again. It felt good to make him laugh. It felt normal, natural, like it used to–

“God, I missed you,” Tarrant blurted out before he could think better of it.

Oron stopped. After a moment he hurriedly averted his eyes, muttering: “You're the one who left.”

“I did.” Tarrant had left, and it had torn Oron's life to pieces. He'd never thought... “If I'd known–”

“You would have done the same damn thing,” Oron told him. “Don't lie, Bullet, you're not any good at it.”

Tarrant didn't think that was fair. He'd been very convincing playing a Federation officer when he first met Avon – then again, maybe that came naturally.

“I would have taken you with me,” he said.

Oron looked up, examining him carefully – probably looking for dishonesty. Tarrant felt exposed, vulnerable. He'd revealed something he shouldn't, he just knew it.

“I wouldn't have come,” Oron said, taking Tarrant by surprise. That was evident on his face, apparently, and Oron seemed surprised that he was surprised. “You know me. I'm not one to throw away everything I have on one of your bloody heroic whims.”

“Aren't you?” Tarrant asked, which made Oron look puzzled. He grinned. “I mean, you're here now.”

Oron averted his eyes again, muttering under his breath. “I have my own reasons.”

_Of course you do._ Tarrant didn't bother asking what they were. _Whims._ Of course Oron would think of it like that. Why shouldn't he? Tarrant had never explained to anyone – how could he?

“Why did you leave?” Oron suddenly asked, apparently wondering the same thing. “I never understood. You had everything you could ever want – everything anyone could ever want. But it wasn't enough. And you ran. Why?”

Tarrant hesitated. He could, and maybe should, just spill all – but how, when he hardly knew what it was himself? Why would Oron believe him, when he had such good reason to be angry Tarrant left at all?

“...I discovered something I couldn't abide,” he said.

After a long moment, Oron sighed. “That's the best I'm going to get out of you, isn't it?”

And Tarrant grinned. “What can I say, I'm predictable.” At Oron's roll of the eyes, he carried on. “It wasn't like I planned it,” he said. “Impulsive as ever, I'm afraid. I took a pursuit ship and scarpered. It really is that simple.”

He was lying again, but this time Oron chose not to draw attention to it. “Right.” He got up and Tarrant looked up at him, this memory from years ago. Really, Oron was but one friend among many, all of whom he'd left behind. Nothing made him special. Except he was special, and he always had been.

Tarrant could imagine what Oron would say if he told him that. _I'm not, I'm common as muck._ But Oron was special to him.

“I'm going to bed,” Oron told him, rubbing his eyes theatrically. “Don't need any help, do you?”

He grinned and shook his head. “No. I know this ship better than I know myself.”

Oron gave a mysterious smile. “Of course you do.”


	11. Chapter 11

“What do you think happened here?”

After as long as it had taken to get to this star system, their journey towards Belisi had slowed to a crawl on its edge, as they had to drop to infinitesimal speeds to avoid debris hitting them at high force. Scorpio might be the fastest ship in the galaxy these days, but it still had the defenses of a clapped out old cargo ship.

Avon said nothing, staring blankly at the scanners as torn and burnt pieces of metal came flying at them, so Tarrant took it upon himself to answer Dayna's question. “Some sort of space battle, looks like. You don't get damage like that by accident.”

“Oh, brilliant,” Vila drawled. “Sure we'll get a friendly reception?”

Tarrant grinned. “Oh, friendly as ever,” he said, which Vila clearly wasn't reassured by.

Stupidly, he couldn't help sneaking a glance toward Oron, who grimaced as he observed the wreckage ahead of them. _Friendly indeed._ Tarrant couldn't be sure what was going on there now, although he knew it was hardly anyone's top priority at the moment.

“It doesn't look like the results of a shoot-out, though,” Dayna said, distracting him. “More like they were caught in one big explosion, than many small ones.”

In truth, Tarrant wasn't sure he could tell the difference, but he figured this was Dayna's area of expertise and he should take her word for it. “Well, perhaps...” he thought it over, wondering what the explanation for that might be. “...Someone let the enemy get in close, then hit self-destruct. Turned themselves into one big bomb. It would explain the chaos, at least.”

Dayna nodded like this made sense, while Oron flinched. “Brave.”

“Very.” It was the sort of thing Tarrant could see himself doing, hence why it was so easy to think of – however he didn't know if he'd ever actually have the guts to go through with it. He'd never been the most selfless person.

Soolin sighed deeply. “So, if we think the Federation found whoever it is we're looking for, should we turn tail and run?”

“No,” Avon said flatly, making them all jump. “We head on to Belisi, as planned.”

That was even more surprising, and Vila leapt to his feet. “Now hang on Avon!” he said. “This really isn't necessary. Look, I know you wanted to find the – rebel army, or whatever we were looking for – but the Federation found them first, clearly! All we're doing is walking to our deaths, and I'm not about to blow myself up like that person!”

Slowly, Avon got to his feet, cool and collected as ever. “If, as Tarrant suggests, whoever was in charge here sacrificed themselves, no doubt they only did so to give others the opportunity to escape. Which means there are others, who we can find. However, we can only do so if we have some information to go on, and if Belisi was their base then that is where we'll find it. _That_ is why we must continue.”

Vila frowned. “This isn't like you, Avon.”

“Isn't it?” Soolin scoffed. “Remember that asteroid? Gambling with our lives is just like him.”

Tarrant puzzled over this. Taking such risks never used to be like Avon, with his prodigious capability for self-preservation. Indeed it's the sort of thing Avon used to tell him off for. However it's becoming ever more like Avon, and he isn't sure what to make of that.

Avon didn't blink at Soolin's comment, while Oron leaned forward with a sigh. “For what it's worth, I agree,” he said. Vila shot him a look, almost betrayed. “I've come all this way and seen a lot of people die, I want to know what happened.” He gave Tarrant a sly look. “We might all have to be as brave as that pilot, that's all.”

Tarrant felt himself growing flustered. Clearly someone had faith in his courage.

Fingers tapping against the grey console, Avon said simply: “I see.” Then he turned around. “Dayna, Tarrant?”

Dayna shrugged. “Well I'm not afraid of whatever's waiting,” she said, reaching for her gun absent-mindedly – a gun she didn't have on her, it turned out. “And if everyone's dead, here and on Oron's ship, the Federation have likely cleared off already. We might as well have a look.”

With a nod, Avon turned to him. “Oh, you know me Avon,” he said. “Any excuse to go charging into danger.”

“That hardly makes me feel better about the plan,” Avon murmured, but he didn't seem ready to change his mind. “So we're agreed. We carry on to Belisi.”

Vila sighed. “None of you are going to listen to me, are you?”

“Do we ever?”

He glared at Avon's remark. “Fine. But keep in mind: if we're all killed, I will use my last breath to say 'I told you so'.”

* * *

“I think Vila is mad at me.”

Tarrant looked up, surprised to turn around and see Oron standing behind him, looking uneasy. Were they at the point they could talk to one another about their problems, then? “Well, I wouldn't worry about it,” he said, focusing on the controls in front of him, not willing to push his luck. “Vila's grudges don't last very long.”

That was a lie. In truth, to him at least it seemed like Vila could hold a grudge forever, but it didn't matter because he wasn't brave enough to force a confrontation over them.

In truth he could understand why Vila was annoyed. If he had grown used to thinking Oron would back him up whenever he genuinely had a point – and Tarrant couldn't say Vila _didn't_ have a point about the danger they might be walking into, even if it wasn't a point _he_ was particularly likely to listen to.

When he sneaked a glance back to evaluate Oron's reaction (maybe he couldn't help but sneak a glance back), he looked less than convinced, but let it go. “If you say so,” he shrugged. “I only told you to be reassuring. I got the impression you were a bit jealous.”

Tarrant's heart skipped a beat. _No, of course not, why would you even think that, why would I be jealous,_ all those seemed like the smart things to say, but instead what he came up with was: “Is there anything to be jealous of?”

Well, that was smooth. Tarrant felt himself growing embarrassed again, but after they locked eyes a moment, Oron just laughed at him. “Don't worry, he's not my type.”

As explanations went, that was – well. What was it, really? “Why not?” Tarrant asked, surprised by his own surprise. “He's a lot like you.”

“Exactly, that's the problem.” At Tarrant's further expression of befuddlement, Oron rolled his eyes. “We're not all raging narcissists like you are.”

Tarrant bristled at that. “I'm not a narcissist!” At Oron's dubious face, he doubled down. “I am not!” For some reason, he thought of Servalan, and that didn't make a lot of sense. “Come on. I mean, _you're_ nothing like me, and I slept with you didn't I?”

Oron stopped, and tilted his head to the side curiously. Cursing himself, Tarrant realised he hadn't spoken about it so frankly before – their relationship was one couched in adolescent innuendo, boyhood favours, plausible deniability. It wasn't like it made any difference if he came out and said yes, they were sleeping together – for a certain definition anyway – but still it felt...

“Excuse me for interrupting your most important conversation, Master.”

He sighed. He often found Slave annoying, but at the moment he couldn't help but be relieved the computer had interceded. “What is it, Slave?”

“It appears, if I'm not mistaken, that we have arrived at our destination.”

_Oh, thank god._ This would all be over soon, one way or another. “Put it on the screen then.”

Slave did so, and Tarrant blinked in confusion, struggling to comprehend the strange silver shape in front of him.

“What is that?”


	12. Chapter 12

“Some sort of artificial satellite, I suspect,” Avon said, contemplating the sight Tarrant had summoned them all to assess.

“What's it for?” asked Dayna.

“Oh, the usual things satellites are for. Meteorological information, map-making, defense systems – that sort of thing. The more important question is, who's there right now?”

Vila grimaced. He was liking the sound of this less by the moment, and he hadn't started off thrilled to begin with. “What do you mean?” Tarrant leant forward to ask.

Avon turned to Videl. “You said the man on your ship was making contact with an acquaintance by this planet, yes?” He nodded, and so Avon carried on. “If, as we suspect, this location is a rebel hub, it seems much simpler to take over one satellite – one likely possessing a skeleton crew, if any at all – than a whole planet. No doubt that's where we'll find who we're looking for, if we find them at all.”

He looked strangely wistful for a second. Hairs on the back of Vila's neck stood on end, remembering what they had come past to get here. “What about the space battle?” he pointed out. “If there were any rebels here, and they weren't all killed, won't they have cleared out after that?” Frankly the first sounded more likely, but no need to depress himself further.

Avon gritted his teeth. “ _If_ they have done so, we have no method of finding them unless we can access the information they left behind. Now if you have nothing helpful to contribute, as per usual, kindly shut up.”

_Well, that's me told._ Vila sat back in his chair sullenly. You know, he always used to think Avon secretly respected him, as much as Avon respected anyone, but these days half the time he didn't know what Avon thought.

All of a sudden Tarrant stood up, occupying the room with those long legs of his. “Well, if we're not simply going to stand around chatting all day, we might as well hop over and check it out,” he declared. “Now who is coming with me?”

“I am,” said Avon, without bothering to provide an explanation, of course.

Tarrant looked mildly surprised, but nodded. “Anyone else?”

“Me and Dayna,” said Soolin, making Dayna look up at her in annoyance. Not that Dayna was one to recoil from danger, but it was the principle of being volunteered against her will, Vila reckoned. “You would be a fool to go walking into an unknown, potentially dangerous situation without your two best shots on hand.”

With another nod, Tarrant then turned to Vila. He sighed. “Don't get a choice, do I?”

Videl leaned forward, puzzled. “Aren't you going to stay here and operate the teleport?”

He looked down. That was, in fact, a very good idea – an excuse to keep away from anything dangerous. He would have to thank Videl for that. After all, who was better at waiting around and operating the teleport than him? Only Cally, and she was dead.

And yet he wasn't as eager to shy from peril as he should be. He knew how the others would respond all too well: _cowardly Vila, same as ever._ For some reason he suddenly cared what they thought of him. Avon's words rang in his ear: _if you have nothing helpful to contribute..._

Question was, what was he feeling more: afraid, or spiteful?

“No,” said Avon, making the decision for him. “If you are correct and the space station is abandoned, then we will likely need your skills to get where we need to go. So come on.”

That was a fair point, and one that appeased Vila's ego to boot. Still, he wasn't exactly thrilled to go running into danger on Avon's say-so. “Well, someone has to stay behind and operate the teleport.”

“Yes, they do,” said Avon, and then turned to Videl.

He blinked in surprise. “Really?”

“Of course.” Avon grinned. “After all, you are our guest. I could never forgive myself if you put yourself in danger on our account.”

That was a blatant lie and everyone knew it. This was Avon's way of saying he didn't trust Videl, not fully, not yet. Vila wasn't sure he saw the logic behind leaving the one person you don't trust behind alone on your ship, where they could take it and run if they felt like it, but then again it wasn't like _he_ trusted Videl not to run out on him any less than the others.

Videl shrugged. “Alright, but I'm still quite a novice at this thing,” he said. “Don't blame me if you end up scattered across the galaxy.”

“Oh, chances are that'll happen regardless,” Avon said, and Vila shot him a look of _why are we doing this then?_

Tarrant took a step back, squeezing Videl's shoulder warmly. “Don't worry. Well be back soon, promise.” He grinned. “As much as I can, anyway.”

Videl looked up, and the two of them locked eyes for a moment. _Brilliant, more emotional drama._ Oron sure seemed to have gotten over his life being ruined quickly. Maybe that was why he didn't take Vila's side during their discussion before.

Yeah, he knew he was being petty about that. He had no reason to just expect Videl to agree with him. But...

Once he managed to tear his eyes away, Videl rolled them, putting up a front of apathy. “Yes, thank you, I think I can avoid burning the ship to cinders for fifteen time units,” he said. “All of you, put your bracelets on, get in line. I can manage this.”

Slowly they all shuffled into place, cold metal encasing their wrists, and Vila met the faint buzz of the teleport with resigned familiarity.

* * *

The space station was cold, hollow, and empty.

Avon reminded himself that he expected exactly that, and hence, there was no cause for disappointment. No alarms heralded the intrusion of something unexpected. “Doesn't look like there's anyone here,” he murmured, only half remembering he was at the head of a crew, _his_ crew, who looked to him for – well, something or other.

“How do you know?” That was Soolin, of course. She was stoic, and hence, practical, like he was once – a long time ago. Such hollow superstition wasn't like him, of course; he must have taken it from Cally, after she–

“No doubt an army of rebels would have alarms set against invaders. If nothing's gone off, that means there's no-one left to be alarmed.” Reason appeased, if weakly, he ordered his people in the direction of his instincts. “There must be a control centre around here somewhere. That's where we'll find what we need. Come.”

It wasn't as if he had any idea where this control centre might be, but the space station didn't look that big from afar, surely if they stumbled around long enough they'd find it somewhere. All of them followed him, anyway, even Tarrant, which Avon took as evidence none of them had a better idea. Tarrant. They had never gotten along, Tarrant had always seemed ready to steal Avon's command from right under him, but if Tarrant found him what he was looking for he would–

He stumbled slightly along the interminable silver corridors. But none of the others mentioned it, so Avon fooled himself they hadn't noticed, and if no-one but himself had noticed, had it really happened at all?

“I think this is it,” Vila knocked on one of the indistinguishable doors they passed by, the knock of his fingers against the metal ominously certain. “Looks like the door on the ship we picked Videl up from. Probably a command centre.”

Avon deferred to his professional knowledge. Vila easily dealt with any locks, and when the door was open, he burst in to the flashing lights of a mainframe computer. This was it. This was _it_.

Getting past any security systems they had was as easy for him as opening the door was for Vila. Clearly, whoever set it up wasn't an expert. It was him, it had to be him, who else would bring him all this way?

He had to know, where they had gone, what they needed, what he can do – so much so that as he punched up numbers and lists, he barely heard anything his crew said behind him.

“Hey,” murmured Vila, sounding hopelessly out of breath, “is anyone else feeling woozy?”

Avon attributed this to Vila being Vila, until he observed his own knuckles, turning white as he clutched at the computer frame just to stay upright. But then the information he had asked for appeared in shining green upon the screen, names and dates and spaceship numbers, a planet he had never heard of–

“Bad air,” Dayna announced, an odd panic flooding her voice. “The air's bad. Vila, we need to get out of here!”

“Oron!” That was Tarrant, of course, calling on his long lost love to rescue them. “Oron, something's gone wrong here. We need you to beam us back, now.” At the following silence, Avon smiled mirthlessly. “Oron?! Oron!”


	13. Chapter 13

"Should I answer that?"

Crackly over the communication units, Comissioner Sleer's voice was as smooth and as self-satisfied as ever. "Oh, you can if you like, but I wouldn't recommend it. They've probably noticed something's wrong by now, so unless you can come up with a quick excuse as to why you're not helping... or you just want to gloat. Some final words for an old friend. Wouldn't that be fitting?"

Videl swallowed grimly. Part of him thought he owed it to at least explain to Bullet what he'd done, so he wouldn't die wondering. But no, he didn't owe Bullet – Tarrant – anything. This was only happening because of him, after all. Videl had gone into this knowing Tarrant would be dead at the end of it, not regretting that at all, and suddenly remembering what that winning smile looked like wasn't going to change things.

"Still, it's probably not a good idea," Sleer carried on, and he gritted his teeth in irritation - he should be grateful the woman had offered him an opportunity he thought he'd never have again, but he could tell she was doing it for entirely selfish reasons, and moreover he disliked her strongly. Everything she said and did made him think of a cat toying with its prey. "This crew has a habit of thinking their way out of problems once they know what they are."

Tarrant's voice on the other end of the bracelet had fallen silent, apparently realising Oron wasn't going to answer. He wasn't sure he knew how to answer a message on this thing anyway. "I see," he drummed his fingers against the console nervously. "How long do I have to wait?"

"Relax, your ship and crew are waiting just outside the range of Scorpio's detectors." _My ship._ That was what he had done all this for: a ship of his own, a clean record, an official posting as a Federation pilot. Everything he ever wanted. Everything that was taken from him unfairly. Strange, now the moment was upon him he wasn't more excited, but he supposed he was getting older. "They'll be unconscious within a matter of minutes, dead within hours. Just be patient."

Despite himself, Videl flinched. He couldn't help but see Bullet passed out on some cold metal floor, looking the way he used to when he slept, peaceful and without a care in the world, not knowing his death was creeping upon him every moment. If he was awake, he would fight. Videl knew him. That was why it was better he have no idea, but still...

“A slow death. It doesn't suit him,” he muttered.

On the other end of the line, Sleer giggled girlishly. It wasn't as disarming as it should have been. “Well, you have my permission to teleport over yourself and shoot him, if you think that better. And that you can make it back in time. I admit, it is a shame to have them die without knowing whose plan it was – and how sweet gallant Tarrant gave me the idea–”

"Oh, shut up."

The communication line prickled. Videl knew he shouldn't say anything, but he was well and truly fed up with her gloating; if she was always this insufferable then no wonder Avon and friends wanted her dead. "Enough of this cold hard ice queen, 'oh how silly it is he might have thought I cared for him, how much I don't care that he's about to die' act. You don't fool me. Are all you Alpha grades this bloody repressed?"

He'd seen through her since the moment she walked aboard the spacedocks of the backwater planet he'd been looking for work on, and she'd told him all about the foolish enemy she'd been pursuing for over a year, who shared his adolescent stories with her in a moment of vulnerability. Videl remembered how charming Bullet could be, even to people who thought they were immune to his sort of charm. She wouldn't have needed him yo begin with if she'd just shot Tarrant on Virn - but no, it had to be a stupidly overelaborate scheme, so she could prove to herself she had no problems seeing him dead, while not having to kill him herself.

Ridiculous, but Videl had long since known how the Alpha grades used people like him to do their dirty work.

After a pregnant silence, she spoke. "I understand you're under a lot of stress at the moment, so I won't hold that against you," she said. "If you'll excuse me, I have other matters to attend to. I'll speak with you shortly... Captain Oron."

He sighed as the communicators switched off. Tarrant's voice didn't come back through the teleport either. He was alone.

Oron chewed his nail nervously. It wasn't as if he was completely unaffected by all the people who had died or were going to die in this plan, he wasn't a monster. But there was nothing he could do about it now. When Sleer said she wanted him to board a ship that had met with some disaster, he didn't realise it was a disaster she and her colleagues had engineered. He wouldn't have expected to care anyway. The sort of rich layabouts who can afford to traverse the galaxy on a whim, those are a credit a dozen, and Videl couldn't have imagined wasting any grief over them.

Apparently, that was an easier opinion to hold a billion miles away, than surrounded by their corpses.

As for the space battle on the edge of this galaxy, he didn't even know what had happened there. Perhaps only one person had died, and they had killed themselves. Perhaps, but it seemed unlikely. Then there was Tarrant, and Vila, and all the rest of them. Videl flinched. Sleer had ordered him to lure them all into a trap, but Tarrant and Avon were the ones she really cared about. She might not have minded if the thief, easily cowed and intimidated apparently if Bullet had managed it, with no political opinions of his own, survived. He'd hoped that Vila would have stayed to work the teleport, that he didn't have to die, but he did. Videl liked Vila, but not enough to give the game away.

He couldn't convince himself that he wasn't responsible for this murder, this mass murder. But he reasoned, he didn't indulge any romantic notion that their little rebellion would actually succeed. He'd been planet hopping when Star One had been blown to bits, and he hadn't seen much of the oppressed masses yearning to breathe free - only a lot of people terrified to have the system they relied upon, cruel and unjust as it may be, torn away from them.

Something was going to kill them all in the end, and so it might as well be him, someone who stood to benefit from it. Selfish, sure, but there's nothing unusual about that. Besides, he was a Federation cadet. Killing people under orders was what they did.

_Bullet didn't. That's why he left._ Videl flinched. He had always known that, he thought, but he didn't want to acknowledge it, busy stewing in his bitter abandonment. _I discovered something I couldn't abide._ It would be just like him to come all that way and then bulk at killing the innocent, and so to throw everything away without a thought for the consequences, because after all, when had consequences ever applied to people like him? He was - noble, in every sense of the word.

Videl could see him now, struggling until the end, to stay awake, to save his friends, to contact Oron - he would never realise he was betrayed until someone said it to his face. It wasn't right. He didn't want to care, but...

"Orac."

Awkwardly he fumbled for the key Vila had shown him, the computer buzzing back to life sharply. "I need you to send me across to the space station," he said before Orac could comment.

"I will do no such thing," the computer rebuked him. "I have monitored your communications and am aware you have lured the crew into a trap on behalf of our enemy. You were discussing transporting over so you could kill them more efficiently. I will not aid in your plan-"

For a computer who he'd been told spent half its life trying to get its crew killed for stupid reasons, Orac seemed rather upset by this. "Yes, but maybe I've changed my mind," he said. "Maybe I've realised I've left the only man I've ever loved to die, and if I don't move now he's gone for good." Orac whirred, thinking this over, and he sighed. "Look, if you don't send me over they're dead anyway, so you might have to trust me."

"I am a computer. I am incapable of trust."

"Yeah, me too, but do it anyway."

* * *

“Something's wrong,” Tarrant announced obviously, no longer wasting his breath on someone who wasn't answering. “They must have – on Scorpio, gotten to him – we have to help–” he struggled to explain, but cut off wheezing midway through.

Avon, having finally come down from that damn computer, sat upon the floor deathly still, inhaling and exhaling as slowly as possible. “Perhaps he is not answering because he is doing exactly as told,” he murmured, giving Tarrant a sharp look. “Perhaps your long lost love had lured us into a trap, and we have followed dutifully.”

Tarrant shook his head, meaning to deny everything. “He wouldn't–” but that was as far as he got before he couldn't speak anymore. Oron wouldn't betray him though. He couldn't. No matter how they felt about each other now, they were still–

“Why didn't he run?” Vila suddenly mused from nowhere, slouched against the wall. _Shut up, Vila, don't waste your breath,_ Tarrant instinctively wanted to chide him, before he the words sunk in. “On that first ship, where we met him? We saw what a good pilot he was. Why put out a distress call at all, and just not take the controls and get out of there? Unless he was waiting for us.”

And Tarrant racked his brains, desperately searching for some reason Vila was wrong, but he could barely think at all, he was choking.

Before he could respond, Dayna spoke up: “He wasn't surprised,” she said. _What?_ As she elaborated, she looked faintly embarrassed. “I talked to him earlier, and I mentioned – indirectly – about Servalan. About _you_ and Servalan. And he wasn't surprised. As if someone else had told him. As if–”

“She told him,” Tarrant finished for her. Suddenly, his heart felt as hollow as his lungs.

Another voice appeared from nowhere: “For what it's worth, I would have figured that out on my own. You weren't very subtle about it.”


	14. Chapter 14

Tarrant span around. By his side, yet again, was Oron, and for a second he forgot everything the others had told him, and thought this must be his best friend come to his rescue, like he would expect.

Then he saw the oxygen mask upon Oron's face. He knew what he was walking into. And he didn't bring enough for the rest of them, apparently.

“Videl.” Coldness entering his voice, Tarrant took a step back to brace himself against the wall. He didn't want to look weak for this. “It's true then? You have betrayed us?”

After a moment's hesitation, Oron nodded, ominous breathing filling the air – or what was left of it. “I've betrayed you,” he said. His voice was less muffled than you'd expect. “I don't know these people.” Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw Vila flinch, but he ignored it. Behind the mask, he thought he saw Oron give him a small smile. “Are you really surprised? Come now, it's fitting. You betray me, I betray you.”

At that Tarrant recoiled, offended. “I never–”

“Oh, does it matter now?!”

He stopped. Perhaps it didn't. He'd never intended to betray Oron, but that didn't mean he hadn't, having thrown his life away and never even realised he'd done it. Yes, he could see how that would drive Oron to want him dead, to leap upon the first opportunity to do so, to spend all this time luring him in. He thought he'd been forgiven too easily.

Taking a few seconds to summon as much breath as he could, bravely, recklessly, he started to walk forward. “Alright, Oron, if you want revenge, I'll come quietly.” Oron had a gun and was aiming it at him. He wasn't surprised. Idly, Tarrant wondered if he would believe him – Oron knew him well enough to know he'd never come quietly to anything, in more ways than one. “But let the others go. As you said, you don't know them, they've done nothing to do you.” He was going to die in any case, so he might as well make this one last desperate attempt to save the others. He didn't want to die helpless.

Oron stared at him for a long moment. Then, all of a sudden, he started to laugh. Tarrant blinked. “You haven't changed at all, have you? Still thinking the whole world revolves around you.” _What?_ He wondered, starting to feel weak again, and Oron explained. “Rest assured, I don't give a damn whether you live and die. But I've been offered a good price for your heads. Too good to knock back.”

Tarrant struggled not to flinch. Oron being driven to loathe him was one thing, but not to care at all– “What's that then?” he asked.

“My record expunged. An official certificate of graduation from the FSA. My own ship, and a crew to man it.” Oron shrugged. “Everything I ever wanted.”

“Everything?”

Silence. Oron didn't seem to know how to respond at first. “...It was a long time ago.”

“I suppose it was.” Tarrant didn't know how to respond either. Swallowing a dry, scratchy lump in his throat, he carried on. “I wouldn't have thought that of you, though, to kill for personal gain. I thought you were better than that.”

Oron's finger tightened on the gun. “Then you're a fool.”

“It seems so.” Tarrant had realised by now he wasn't going to talk Oron into helping them. None of the others seemed to have an idea either, if how they were letting him carry on was anything to go by. All he was doing was wasting his breath, but perhaps he could talk himself to death before Oron got the chance to pull the trigger. He'd still be dead, but at least it would deny him the satisfaction.

But he couldn't think of anything else to say. So he stood there, waiting, with the man he'd once loved aiming a gun at him, primed and ready to fire.

Who didn't.

Tarrant frowned as the impasse continued, as Oron's finger twitched against the trigger, but did not pull. If he was so sure of himself, what was he waiting for?

“Why did you come here, then?” he asked. Oron looked surprised by the question. “It wasn't just to gloat, to see my face as I realised I'd been betrayed – not if you're really not doing this for personal reasons. What then? One last act of friendship? You realised I'd prefer a quick death by bullet to quietly falling asleep?” He grinned and, slowly, started to walk forward again.

Oron's hand clutched the gun, but he didn't shoot and he didn't speak. Tarrant continued. “Well, get on with it, then. That mask won't last forever, and I'm sure you have someone waiting for you – the person who made you that deal, the one person I was stupid enough to mention you too. My mistake, I'm afraid. But there's no fixing that now, so.”

When he came to a stop, Oron's gun pressed coldly against his belly. Tarrant felt another wave of weakness, and had to clutch Oron's shoulder to keep upright. There was something rather symbolic about that.

With the other hand, Tarrant took the gun, pushing it upwards. Oron let him. He was taller than Oron, but still the other man could just about reach, so Tarrant rested the barrel gently against his forehead. “If you don't mind, I'd rather as quick a death as possible,” he explained. When he met Oron's eyes, he thought he saw tears. “You're making that rather difficult. Go on, man, shoot me! I know you must want to. I understand. I've imagined worse ways of dying, for what it's worth. Indeed, I can't think of anyone I'd rather–”

There was a bang.


	15. Chapter 15

Soolin didn't miss her chance. It took Tarrant a second to piece together what happened; that the bang, the first one he heard, wasn't a gunshot, but the metal of the space station shrieking, hit by some sort of shockwave. Oron looked up, distracted, and the second noise they heard, that _was_ a gunshot.

Oron slumped to the floor, and Tarrant followed. He caught the man before his skull could crack against the ground beneath them, but it only helped so much. Something red was blooming against the dull grey of Oron's jumpsuit. _Percussion bullets. We must not have changed ammunition since Virn._ The thought made him want to laugh. The wound was messy, ugly, real, and Tarrant felt warm as blood seeped into his clothes.

Dazed, Oron let himself loll in Tarrant's arms. Tarrant realised he was holding on to a man who had been holding him at gunpoint not thirty seconds earlier. It was absurd, but he could do little else. “What happened?” he asked.

“Servalan,” Avon said from behind them. “Or Commissioner Sleer, as you likely know her. No doubt she presumed you had already boarded the ship she sent for you, and so she was safe to dispose of it and you with it.” Tarrant looked up over his shoulder. The four of them stood in a line, Soolin still with her gun out, face cold and hard. “The shockwave distracted you long enough to let Soolin shoot. We shall have to thank her for that next time we see her. I'm afraid you should have seen this coming. She's not the type to like to see a talented Delta rise high in the world. If you knew the first thing about her, you would have known that.”

Oron scoffed – or coughed up blood, it was hard to tell. “Yes, well, we can't all afford to spend our time following every piece of tawdry celebrity gossip.” That actually made Avon smile, and Tarrant hated it.

Panicked, he turned back to Oron, watching him bleed out. “You'll be alright,” he insisted, dumbly trying to staunch the wound with his hands, even as Oron was already going limp against him. He could see the man was dying, but he refused to believe he would die. He couldn't. “Once we get you back to the ship, we'll–”

“And how are we going to do that?” Interrupted Vila, sounding drunk again – Tarrant knew that was just from the lack of oxygen, but still. “Face it, nothing's changed. Now we all get to die slowly together.”

Tarrant flinched. Deep down, he knew Vila was right. As the adrenalin faded from his veins it was getting harder to keep his eyes open, there wasn't enough air left, and it would be easy to lean over and–

“Orac,” Oron gasped. His eyes snapped back open, and he looked past Tarrant to the others. “I had to activate him to come over here. You can call him and beam out whenever you like.”

 _Oh._ Tarrant had been so distracted he didn't even think of that. Still, there was no time to waste. “Orac! Teleport, now!” he heard Avon bark sharply into the bracelet, and then the faint buzz of the beam surrounded him, before they returned to the dull surrounds of Scorpio's flight deck. Tarrant gasped, the sensation of oxygen, real oxygen, even a thousand times recycled, suddenly intoxicating.

Bracelet still clamped to his wrist, Oron came with him. He lay on the floor here like he did on the space station. He was still dying?

“Oron? Oron!” Tarrant shook him fitfully, and blood spilled on the ground.

He groaned. “What?” he asked. “Do I have to answer your questions before I can die in peace? Typical. Well, I suppose you must be confused. Still,” he opened his eyes once more, “what's the point in killing you now?”

Tarrant could only stare down at him, dumbfounded and disbelieving. “You wouldn't have killed me.”

Oron smiled slightly. “That's your problem, Bullet.” Shakily, he reached up, caressing Tarrant's jaw with his fingers. “Always thinking everyone's as noble as you are.”

With that, he was gone. The fingers fell away and his body went stiff, dark eyes cold and blank. Tarrant was left with only the corpse of a loved one he'd left behind long ago.

* * *

As they watched Tarrant cling to the body, Avon couldn't help but think _you damned fool._ The boy had been blinded, by love and loyalty and other things he should have learned better than to rely on. He should have realised it was too much of a coincidence, that Videl should re-enter his life days after his little dalliance with Servalan, if he was stupid enough to mention him to her. Avon insulted Tarrant's brains often, but he never really thought he was _that_ dumb.

But he couldn't pretend it was only Tarrant who'd been foolish. He'd realised from the beginning that they couldn't trust the man, even if he hadn't known what was happening, but he convinced himself it didn't matter. Perhaps he believed Tarrant, that even if he had come here intending to do so, Oron didn't actually have it in him to turn traitor. Perhaps he simply thought if they were in danger, they'd find away out of it, as they always did.

But in truth he didn't think anything. If he had thought for half a second, he would have put together what was happening easily, but he was too driven, too obsessed, too blind–

Of course, he had found what he was looking for. Or some tiny scrap of it. A hint that made the gaping chasm between what he had and what he wanted seem ever wider, and what Tarrant had lost for him to get it ever more unfair.

It wasn't as if Avon particularly cared about Tarrant and his broken heart. At least, he didn't want to care about it.

Tarrant was still wrapped body, almost catatonic. Dayna looked half-ready to rush to his arms and comfort him, but she wasn't sure if she should. Vila watched the congealing puddle of blood on the floor with a grimace. He knew someone would have to clean that up – most likely him.

Eventually, Soolin broke the silence. “Well, what do we do with him?” she asked. “I don't think we have an incinerator on board.”

“No,” said Tarrant. Avon quirked a small smile. Even if they did, he understood Tarrant wouldn't have Videl turned to nothing but dirt and ashes. He couldn't stand that. “We'll give him a proper space burial. As an honoured space captain.” _Honoured by rebel and a deserter._ “That's what he would have wanted.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, we're almost done here, the final chapter is more of an epilogue (albeit one that might end up longer than the last couple of chapters combined).


	16. Epilogue

Soolin didn't attend the funeral, if that was the right word for it. It didn't seem right, when she was the one who killed him. She doubted Tarrant would want her there, and frankly, she didn't want to be there.

It wasn't as if she regretted her actions. Oron had been about to kill them all, one way or another. She had the briefest of chances to shoot him, so she took it. That came as naturally to her as breathing.

She retreated to her rooms to see Donna the Dinosaur, perched on the end of her bed, waiting. “What are you looking at me like that for?” she jibed.

Footsteps rushed past her door. She recognised them immediately – brisk, bold and careless. Identifying people by the sound of them walking was a survival skill she had long since honed. She knew she was the last person he would want to see, and he was the last person she wanted to see, but despite her better instincts she stepped out into the corridor anyway.

“Tarrant?”

He stopped. When he turned to face her she could tell he'd been crying, although he tried to hide it. He even managed something of a smile, albeit not one up to his usual standards. “Soolin,” he said. “Is something the matter?”

She approached him cautiously, not sure how to broach the subject. “...Are you alright?” she asked, the words feeling foreign on her tongue.

Tarrant took a deep breath. “As alright as you can be, I suppose, when you've had your long time best friend and sometime lover betray you, then die in your arms.”

He said it lightly, but nonetheless she flinched. “I'm sorry.” This didn't come easy to her, either the emotions or the apologies, but it was true.

After a moment, Tarrant shook his head. “You did what you had to. If it wasn't for you, we'd all be dead.” He paused. “Besides, we killed your lover the first time we met. So fair is fair, isn't it?”

That was also true, but– “I didn't love Dorian.” Indeed, that was part of what she had liked about him – he was so old and cynical, he didn't expect her to love him. All he wanted was her body and her gunhand, he never asked for something she couldn't give.

Granted, she had had no idea _why_ he was so old and cynical, but that was neither here nor there.

She realised that by stating that she'd asked a question, one Tarrant was unlikely to answer. He averted his eyes. “Anyway, I was headed to the flight deck,” he said. “I always feel better when I have a ship to fly.”

Soolin nodded. Yes, she thought that would make Tarrant feel better. Surely he wouldn't feel any better standing around talking to her. As he started to walk away she sighed. _I don't get paid enough for this._ Then she smirked. Of course, Avon hadn't actually paid her in months; none of their schemes ever seemed to come off well enough for him to have anything to pay her with. And yet he never seemed to worry that she would cut her losses and run, find someone more reliable, less dangerous, less likely to get her killed to sell her skill to. It was what she had always done before.

And yet _she_ knew she wasn't going to leave. She was in too deep. Despite herself she cared about these people, like she had cared about no-one since she was eight years old. And despite the impossibility of it she wanted to see them succeed, to bring down the Federation, to prevent any other world being destroyed for their benefit like Gauda Prime was.

She should have let Tarrant go, but before he was out of earshot she idly spoke aloud: “You know, next time you're feeling lonely, I might pick you a partner myself.” When he stopped to stare at her quizzically, she shrugged. “Whenever we let you do it yourself it's a complete disaster.”

Tarrant hesitated for a second, and she was worried he might get angry – but then, he started to laugh. She grinned. _That_ made her feel better.

* * *

Vila staggered onto the flight deck, drink in hand. He'd already cleared up the blood without being asked, because he wanted to avoid the ugly spat that would come with being ordered to perform yet another menial, degrading task because no-one else wanted to. Better he look selfless and noble for doing it, even though he knew already none of them would notice. Afterwards he'd showered in cold water and changed his clothes, but the smell of blood still cling to him. Well, at least the wine was starting to drive it out.

When he stumbled in he found Tarrant sat at the controls, pressing and clicking unnecessarily. _Oh, of course. He doesn't mind flying where his best friend died, then?_ Still, Vila wasn't one to judge, given he was standing there himself. They could hardly just not use the flight deck for the rest of forever could they? He fell into the chair by Tarrant's side. “You're up late,” he said.

Tarrant didn't bother to look at him before answering. “Couldn't sleep,” he said, flicking another switch.

Vila grimaced. Understandable, really. He might never have liked Tarrant, but it was hard not to have some sympathy for him, given the circumstances. “Can I get you a drink?” he asked, because that was what he'd want right now.

Tarrant hesitated a moment before shaking his head. “No, thank you.”

“You sure?”

“ _Yes_ I'm sure.”

Vila bristled. Suddenly he remembered why he disliked Tarrant so much. Alright, maybe it was unfair to be angry at the mad for getting snappish while he was grieving, but it was all so typical – of course he'd take things out on Vila while he was only trying to help. Sometimes Vila wondered why he bothered at all.

Still, after a second Tarrant seemed to think better of it. “Sorry. That wasn't necessary.”

He shrugged. “I'm used to it.” Alright, maybe he let those words serve as something of an accusation, but still he tried to summon his better angels. “For what it's worth, you know, if it makes you feel better, I got taken in by him too,” he said, and immediately started to feel stupid. Oron had been Tarrant's best friend since he was a schoolboy, whereas Vila had known him for what, two weeks? He could hardly blame Tarrant if his response to that was to sneer and tell Vila he had no idea what he was talking about.

Maybe he didn't. But the betrayal still stung. More than it had any right to.

“Granted, I didn't know him like you did, but... I trusted him. Don't know why really,” he continued, and took another gulp of his drink to spur himself on. “And we were both wrong. So at least we're fools together, right?”

It took Tarrant a while to reply. He wasn't staring at the console anymore, but instead into the empty void ahead of them, one that gave no answers to any questions, particularly the crucial one about what happened next. “I thought he must have reminded of you of Gan,” Tarrant said, eventually, to Vila's puzzled frown. He didn't know Tarrant even knew about Gan. “That's why you got attached so quickly. It seemed a reasonable guess – from what Cally told me, I know you and he were... close.”

Vila thought this theory over for a second. “He was nothing like Gan,” he said. “Gan was – open, honest, innocent. He couldn't have betrayed us, he couldn't even have thought of it.” He took another drink. _Close._ That was one word for it. “But I suppose it was... nice. Having someone around who wasn't looking down at me all the time. Someone who treated me like an equal.” _You'll look out for me, right?_ Really, Vila should have left the day Gan died. He should have realised no-one would be looking out for him after that.

He took another drink and, once he had finished, he realised that Tarrant was finally looking at him. Vila caught his eye, and Tarrant smiled, sheepishly. “I suppose I owe you an apology,” he said, to Vila's surprise. “I know I've – well. I've never exactly been very nice to you.”

_Isn't that true._ Still, Vila shrugged. “Sure, but that hardly makes you unique.”

“Not even unusual,” Tarrant nodded. “Still, I – I think I didn't want to get attached to you. I missed him, you see – I missed a lot of what I left behind when I defected, but especially him. I didn't want to feel like I was using the first Delta I came across as a replacement. I didn't want to be that person.” Right. That explained some of Tarrant's behaviour, but not all of it. “And yet... the more time I spent with you, the angrier you made me. Because you _weren't_ him. And you never would be.” Tarrant paused, then laughed. “Strange, isn't it? After all, you've never betrayed me.”

To be fair, he'd hardly been given the chance. So that was it, was it? Why Tarrant was the way he was? Vila wondered if it was just the drink that meant he had no idea what to do with it.

He didn't think this would last. As soon as Tarrant was under stress again, he would lash out at Vila, because that was what Vila was here for, to be lashed out at.

Vila could hardly even bring himself to resent it anymore. He was getting used to not being able to rely on anyone. Hey, Tarrant at least apologised to him sometimes. That was more than he usually got.

* * *

Dayna paced up and down the corridor, summoning her nerve. Strange, that wasn't something she'd ever struggled with before, but this was different from charging into battle with guns blazing. That made her feel in control. This didn't.

Logically, she knew she had no reason to be so anxious. Tarrant probably wanted to see her. She knew Soolin had already talked to him, as had Vila – deep down, Tarrant wasn't the type to cut himself off in his grief, not like Avon. She had comforted him after his brother died, why should this be any different?

She sighed as she came to a stop outside the doorway for the fifth time, watching his curls bounce from a distance. Either he hadn't noticed her, or he was being polite and pretending not to. All this was doing was making her nauseous. _Just go inside. What's the worst that can happen?_

“Tarrant?”

He looked mildly surprised when he turned around to see her, but not enough to tell her for sure whether he knew she was coming or not. “Dayna,” he smiled. “Good, I was getting lonely up here.”

She approached him hesitantly. “Are you alright?”

Tarrant hesitated. “I will be,” he said. “I think.”

Suddenly she wanted to hold him, kiss him, make him better. _Oh, don't I have fantastic timing._ She settled for placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It's okay, I understand.” She didn't, really, but he hoped she would know what she meant.

He looked up at her curiously. “You've forgiven me, then?” he asked, making her blink. “For Servalan?”

_Oh._ Honestly, she'd forgotten she was even mad at him. “Well I have to now, don't I, when she's given you such good reason to regret it?” That made him chuckle. Dayna knew she shouldn't push, not right now, but even if her anger had faded her curiosity still burned, and so she sat in the chair ahead of him and swung around, so she could face him head-on. “I admit though, I still don't understand,” she said, hoping it wouldn't sound like an accusation. “How could you do it? How could you forget everything she's done to us? And _why_?”

Tarrant hesitated. “Servalan and I... I'm afraid we come from rather similar backgrounds,” he said. Dayna blinked. _What does that have to do with anything?_ “Alpha grades, back on Earth. The crème de la crème, best and brightest of the Federation.” He grinned. “Scheming and plotting comes to us like breathing, but we don't fight out in the open. You learn to compartmentalise. You have dinners with the people who'll have your rank stripped. You earn favours from the people who'll have your family exiled. After that, sleeping with the woman who murdered your brother really isn't such a leap.”

Dayna still didn't understand. “That doesn't sound like you,” she said.

“God no!” Tarrant grinned. “I always hated it. I wasn't made for scheming and plotting. That's why I joined the space fleet – I wanted to be a hero, pure and simple. Still...” he paused. “It was my life, for better or for worse.”

This should have all been starting to make sense now. “And Servalan?”

“In another world, I would have been one of her pilots,” said Tarrant. “Probably one of those pretty boys she likes to surround herself with. It would have been an easy life.” He sighed. “Being with her was like... one last taste of everything I'd given up. A memory I could never have back.” At Dayna's stare, he smirked. “What, am I supposed to say I hated it, I realised how she embodied everything that made me leave, I knew I'd never do such a thing again? No, I liked it. I liked _her_.”

Dayna thought this over a moment. Her father had never talked about life back on Earth. She thought it was too painful for him. He must have missed his home, just as Tarrant did.

“Then why _did_ you leave?”

“I discovered something I could not abide.” Dayna glared, and Tarrant seemed to realise he wouldn't get away with giving her that joke of an explanation. “It was because of my brother.”

She blinked. “Deeta?”

“No. Not Deeta,” Tarrant said. “I have another brother. Dev. He's high up in the Federation security forces. You see why I never mentioned him?”

Yes, Dayna could understand that. “What happened?”

“Truth be told, I'm not really sure.” He drummed his fingers along the console nervously. “There was – a big fuss, about the time Blake was arrested. Dev had been acting strangely for days. It made me curious, so I started poking around, looking into files I shouldn't, that sort of thing. I didn't understand much – I'm no computer expert, but...” he hesitated. “I realised a lot of people had died. Suddenly, and in ways that didn't quite make sense.”

Dayna grimaced. She could make sense of it. “A massacre, ordered by the Federation, and covered up by them too.” _By your brother,_ she didn't say aloud.

“Yes, I presume so, although it took me months to be able to admit it to myself,” said Tarrant. “Anyway, not two weeks after I start nosing around, I get given my captain's certificate straight out of nowhere, and sent off into deep space. I got the distinct impression someone was trying to bribe me – and get me out of the way.”

Nodding along, Dayna suggested: “And then you left?”

“Eventually.” She frowned, and he sighed again. “I did try at first. After all, this was what I had been training for my whole life – I was a Federation Space Officer, that was what I was meant to be. And yet... every day I wore that uniform, it was driving me mad. I knew I was no hero. Just one more cog in the system, like my brother – the system that had killed all those people.”

Dayna wanted to reach out and squeeze his hand. Tarrant took a deep breath. “Eventually, I couldn't take it anymore. One day, completely on a whim, I took a pursuit ship and – I ran. As far as I could. Didn't even bring a spare pair of underwear.” That made Dayna giggle, but she stopped when she saw the sadness on his face. “I didn't think about what I was leaving behind. Who I was leaving behind. If I had thought it through at all, I might have gone back for Oron, I might have... oh well. Too late now, isn't it?”

At that, she did reach and grab his hand. “Tarrant, what you did was _brave_ ,” she told him. And yes, she'd always known Tarrant was brave – but there was the sort of bravery needed to charge into any fight without fear, that was more like recklessness, and then there was this. “Not everyone can leave their whole life behind because they know it's wrong.”

“If you say so,” he murmured, mind clearly still on who he had left behind.

Dayna wanted to make him feel better. She wanted to offer – well, whatever might want, really. A release, an escape, and comfort in the arms of someone he could trust. Even when she was angry at him, he could always trust her. And after all, they had almost died today – she didn't think that would stop happening any time soon. Why shouldn't she get to know what it was like, just once before the end?

And yet, she couldn't bring herself to mention it. Tarrant was grieving, for Oron and for other things she didn't quite understand, and she wasn't sure that was what he needed from her. She remembered what Vila had told her. _He probably doesn't want to take advantage of you._ It made her want to laugh. Apparently, the feeling was mutual.

“Alright, I'm headed back to bed,” she said, standing up and snapping him out of his melancholy. “Promise me you won't be sitting up here all night, yes?”

He grinned. “If I am, I swear I'll lie to you about it in the morning.”

She laughed and left him to himself.

* * *

“I wasn't expecting to see you here.”

“You've been sitting here for almost four hours. I would hate to see my ship crashed by a sleep-deprived pilot.”

Tarrant gritted his teeth together as Avon's cold eyes examined him carefully. “I'm not exactly doing much,” he said – explained, or excused himself, depending on your perspective. “Slave can handle the journey back to base. I'd just rather keep an eye on things, if you understand.”

“Oh, I understand perfectly,” said Avon. “It is much easier to immerse yourself in what if comfortable and familiar to you, rather than to think about what's happened.”

Cursing under his breath, Tarrant looked away. Yes, alright, that was exactly what he was doing, but he didn't see what business it was of Avon's either way. “Did you find what you were looking for?” he asked, hoping to distract him or, if not that, at least remind Avon he wasn't the only one tricked by Servalan's little scheme.

Avon frowned for a moment, then turned his back to him, so Tarrant couldn't see how he responded. _Damn it._ “I think so,” he said, quiet and unsure, so unlike how he usually sounded nowadays.

Tarrant was relieved. “So, should I be prepared to chart a course to wherever this damn rebel army is, once we get back to base?”

“No,” Avon shook his head. “There's something I have to do first.”

“Like what?”

He laughed. “Believe me, if I figure it out, I'll let you know.”

Tarrant frowned. He didn't think he was in the mood for Avon's mindgames at the moment.

“I hope you know why she did it.”

Tarrant blinked, startled by Avon's question. “Why who did what?” he asked, and alright, perhaps the lack of sleep was getting to him after all.

“Servalan.” Avon turned back around, gracing him with a patronising smile. “I hope you realise why she went to such lengths to kill you.”

He was starting to feel ill. He didn't want to think about why she had done what she'd done. “Servalan has tried to kill us dozens of times. She's never seemed to need much reason.

“True,” said Avon. “But most of the time, that is because our plans intersect with hers, and she cannot resist the opportunity. Rarely does she lay such an elaborate trap. Surely you have thought about why she did it?”

Tarrant sighed in frustration. “No, but you clearly have, so why don't you tell me?”

Avon smiled. “Because you saw her vulnerable,” he says. “Because you found the human being beneath the dictator of the galaxy, who I doubt even she remembered existed. For that, you could not be allowed to live.” He paused. “I've kissed her, of course, I could have fucked her on Sarran if I wanted to – but I never found anything but a void in her soul. I admit, I have no idea how you did it, but I'm impressed.”

_Impressed._ For once, Tarrant wasn't proud that he'd impressed anybody through anything. It was hard to reconcile the woman who had cried and let him kiss her better on Virn with the woman he knew Servalan was, the woman who engineered everything that followed. He wanted to have fond memories of that tryst, except then he remembered what it led to, and he couldn't – if only he had kept his mouth, or his legs shut, Oron would still be alive. Miserable, but _alive_ –

“If that's what seeing her vulnerable costs, I don't think it was worth it.”

“No, of course you don't.”

Avon kept pacing around him, examining him like an experiment, and Tarrant flinched under the scrutiny. “Avon, could you please go back to bed?” he asked, pride abandoning him. “I realise I was a fool, alright, I should never have trusted him, I should have realised it was one of her plots. You don't have to rub it in.”

To his surprise, Avon frowned. “That's not what I came here to do.” _What then?_ “You seem to forget, I have my own experiences with betrayal.”

_Oh. Of course._ Tarrant felt a twinge of guilt, but he was too tired to try and put it into words. He stared down at his console listlessly – Scorpio's controls were old and outmoded; they didn't look like the ships he and Oron had trained on, not at all. “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to remind you of your beloved Anna Grant. Believe me, if I had, I would have acted differently.”

“I wasn't talking about Anna.” That made Tarrant look back up, puzzled. Avon sighed. “His name was Tynus.” He frowned. He'd never heard of this person – but perhaps that was the point. “He was an old friend – well, something more than a friend, in all honesty. An adolescent dalliance, not unlike your own. Two boys expressing their emerging sexuality together, nothing important, nothing that couldn't be forgotten once it became inconvenient.” He paused. “We were involved in a fraud together. And, when we were caught, I refused to speak a word against him. I'd rather risk life on Cygnus Alpha than give him up. Strange, isn't it?”

Tarrant swallowed, knot in his stomach tightening. “What happened?”

“Years later, I came to collect on the debt he owed me,” said Avon. “I hardly remember why. Something Blake wanted, no doubt. Anyway, rather than oblige, he decided to hand us over to the Federation, and kill me before I could tell them all I knew about him.” With an ugly grimace, Avon finished the story. “We had a fight. I pushed him into a machine that could blast a man with an electric charge strong enough to kill him. And he died.”

_Oh._ Tarrant wasn't blind, he did see the parallel. But it didn't make him feel any better about what had happened.

Avon smiled. "You don't have to spare my feelings. I realise having the people I love betray me and then killing them is one of my worse habits."

Tarrant crooked his neck. "I thought you said you didn't feel anything for him?"

"I didn't. Not at the time. But afterward, it... hurt. Far more than I would have imagined."

He looked away, closing his eyes to prevent any tears escaping, and was surprised to find a hand warm against his shoulder. “You will live through this,” Avon announced, as if he had no choice in the matter. “Betrayal is a fact of life, and it will hurt you until the day you die. But it won't kill you. I know you, Tarrant, and you wouldn't let it.”

Like that he started walking away, willing to retreat and let Tarrant figure the rest of it for himself. Tarrant got to his feet. “Avon!”

Avon stopped. In truth, Tarrant wasn't sure why he stopped him. But there was something he wanter, something he needed, something only Avon could give him. Awkwardly he approached, Avon greeting him with only a raised eyebrow, until Tarrant curled a hand beneath his jaw and pulled him in for a kiss.

He didn't know why he did it. Perhaps Soolin was right, he was lonely. Perhaps he wanted to give himself over to someone he did trust, whether or not he should, whether or not that was any less likely to get him killed than trusting Oron was.

Avon indulged him for awhile, but that's all. Tarrant quickly realised he wasn't being kissed in return, and pulled back, embarrassed. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn't mean to...”

“You don't have to be,” Avon said, strangely gentle with him. “Rest assured, it's nothing personal.”

Tarrant tilted his head to the side, curious. “Let me guess, I'm not your type?”

“Oh, you could be further from it,” Avon told him, to his surprise. “But I love someone else.”


End file.
